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Guantanamo defense lawyers criticize tribunals

Posted on: Friday, 13 January 2006, 13:46 CST

By Jane Sutton

GUANTANAMO BAY U.S. NAVAL BASE, Cuba (Reuters) - U.S. military officers ordered to defend accused war criminals at Guantanamo base in Cuba have joined the outcry of activists assailing the court system for human rights violations.

"It was horrific to sit there and watch this happen," said Army Maj. Tom Fleener, who represented a Yemeni prisoner in pretrial hearings at Guantanamo this week.

The nine Guantanamo prisoners charged so far are accused of conspiring with the Islamist militant al Qaeda group to kill Americans in the September 11 attacks and on the battlefield.

"We live in a country where we've spent a couple hundred years putting together a good system of justice where people have rights to counsel (of their choosing), people have rights to confront accusers, people have rights to evidence," Fleener told journalists.

"None of that stuff is present in these hearings."

The five military defense lawyers appointed so far have challenged every aspect of the tribunals.

Navy Lt. Cmdr. Charles Swift, who represents another Yemeni prisoner, has asked the Supreme Court to rule that U.S. President George W. Bush lacked authority to create the new court system rather than try the prisoners under existing civilian or military law.

The Bush administration and the military prosecutors said the system was designed to provide fair trials for suspected terrorists whose crimes had not been contemplated under existing law.

NECESSARY, BUSH SAYS

In Washington, Bush told reporters on Friday: "Guantanamo is a necessary part of protecting the American people."

Human rights activists said the horrific nature of the charges is being used as an excuse to justify a flawed system that allows the use of secret evidence and evidence that may have been obtained through torture.

"If this is the best we can do, we risk forfeiting our ability to hold ourselves out as examples to the world," said Ben Wizner, who is monitoring the trials for the American Civil Liberties Union.

Fleener said he believed in protecting Americans from al Qaeda but viewed the tribunals as fundamentally unfair.

He is a federal public defender in Cheyenne, Wyoming, in civilian life and an Army reservist called to duty three months ago. His client is an alleged bodyguard for Osama bin Laden and does not want a lawyer appointed by the military enemies who captured him.

Fleener said he would comply with orders to put on a zealous defense but believes representing a client who has rejected him is an ethical violation that could cost him his law license.

Source: REUTERS

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