Friday, June 30, 2006

The obvious solution

Le Thé Chez Vierotchka has a collection of anti-torture videos for your weekend viewing.
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As predicted by Paul Reynolds at the BBC, President Bush is refusing to abandon the military tribunals.

The alternative to military tribunal is to conduct trials by court martial or civilian tribunal. This has been the demand of lawyers for the detainees, and should satisfy international legal standards of a fair trial (see HRW on why the military tribunals do not meet the standard).

Instead, President Bush and the US Republican Party are working on ways to get approval for new tribunals. From the BBC:

Within minutes of the court ruling, a small group of Republican senators were working the phones trying to sort out the mess, reports the BBC's Justin Webb in Washington.

A former military lawyer who is leading the efforts to salvage the tribunal system, Senator Lindsey Graham, predicted that the Senate would begin work on ideas for new tribunals within weeks and vote on the plan in September.

Meanwhile, Sen Arlen Specter, a moderate Republican who chairs the powerful judiciary committee, introduced an "Unprivileged Combatant Act" which would, he said, balance "the need for national security with the need to afford detainees with sufficient due process".


SCOTUSblog and Balkinization are good places to go for informed comment on the legal implications. Further reading from Bloggers Against Torture: Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying, Daring Depravity (who would appreciate coments and criticisms from readers) ... [please add yourselves in the comments].

4 Comments:

Blogger - said...

Thank you to all who have participated in this important month. My heart and appriciation goes out to you all. There were so many bloggers that devoted so much time, it makes me proud. A special thank you goes to elendil for hosting this wonderful event.

11:35 AM  
Blogger Davide Simonetti said...

I agree with the above comments. It was an informative month and should continue. Thanks to all participants.

7:27 PM  
Blogger elendil said...

You should all be very proud of yourselves. Well done everyone.

7:57 PM  
Blogger Vierotchka said...

Thank-you Elendil, and well done all! Please, Elendil, keep the blogroll permanent, as well as this blog - we are not against torture only during the month of June 2006, so keeping up the awareness of torture should be on all of our agendae beyond June 2006. I know I will continue to post videos about torture whenever I find new ones. This blog should also remain alive, where we can share comments and understandings the way we have been doing over the past month.

Best and warmest regards to all,

Rurikid (aka Vierotchka)

3:46 AM  

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