Guantanamo Detainees

While watching the C-SPAN morning show Washington Journal today, there was a segment with an attorney for Kuwaiti detainees at Guantanamo. His position is that most of the Kuwaitis are not terrorists, but were in the wrong place at the wrong time. There are now twelve detainees from Kuwait who have been at Getmo for over three years. One additional detainee was released earlier this month. He was a teacher who had traveled to Pakistan to help Pakistani refugees, he was picked up by a local tribe and sold to the American military for a bounty price of $5000.

The Geneva Conventions guarantee a hearing for any detainee who might not be a combatant as soon as possible. This hearing is designed to determine whether the detainee is a legitimate enemy combatant, and if not it is designed to allow him/her to go free immediately. Unfortunately, it has taken a ruling by the United States Supreme Court to get these hearings for the Kuwaiti detainees.

Could some of these detainees actually be terrorists? Certainly. But we have no way of knowing whether they are or are not at this time without conducting the proper inquiries and hearings. Our government needs to step up to uphold the requirements of the Geneva Conventions so that our soldiers can feel that they too have recourse against their captors. By appealing to the Conventions, captured soldiers or combatants must be accorded consistent protections. The Conventions are not 'antiquated', as Attorney General-nominee Alberto Gonzales would have us believe!!

Check out the website set up by the families of those twelve Kuwaitis who are being held in Cuba.