URGENT ACTION APPEAL
- From Amnesty International USA
----------------------------------
For a print-friendly version of this Urgent Action (PDF):
http://www.amnestyusa.org/actioncenter/actions/uaa15411.pdf
Note: Please write on behalf of these persons even though you may not have
received the original UA
when issued on 26 May 2011. Thanks!
Further information on UA: 154/11 (26 May 2011)
Issue Date: 17 October 2011
Country: USA
DEATH PENALTY ON TABLE FOR GUANTANAMO TRIAL
The death penalty has been approved as an option for the upcoming trial of a
Saudi Arabian man held
at the US naval base at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. He is to be tried by military
commission, under a
system which fails to meet international fair trial standards.
Saudi Arabian national 'Abd al Rahim Hussayn Muhammed al Nashiri has been in US
custody for nearly
nine years. Arrested in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, by local security forces
in October 2002, he
was handed over to US agents a month later, and held in secret custody at
undisclosed locations by
the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) for almost four years, during which time
he was subjected to
torture and other ill-treatment and to enforced disappearance. In September
2006, he was transferred
to US military custody at Guantanamo, where he remains.
On 20 April 2011, the US Department of Defense announced that 'Abd al Rahim al
Nashiri had been
charged under the Military Commissions Act of 2009 with, among other things,
"murder in violation of
the law of war", and "terrorism". He is accused of having had a leading role in
the attack on the
USS Cole in Yemen on 12 October 2000 in which 17 US sailors were killed and 40
others wounded, and
in the attack on the French oil tanker MV Limburg in the Gulf of Aden on 6
October 2002, in which a
crew member was killed.
The prosecution's recommendation that the death penalty be an option at the
trial was approved on 28
September 2011 by the "convening authority" of the military commissions,
retired Navy Vice Admiral
Bruce MacDonald, when he referred the charges against 'Abd al Nashiri on for
trial as capital
charges.
'Abd al Nashiri's arraignment hearing, at which the charges against him may be
read and he will be
called upon to plead, is scheduled for 9 November 2011 at Guantanamo. No date
for his actual trial
has yet been set.
Amnesty International opposes the death penalty unconditionally. While
international human rights
law recognizes that some countries retain the death penalty, it prohibits the
imposition and
execution of a death sentence based on a trial that has not met the highest
standards for fairness.
The US military commissions fail to meet international fair trial standards.
Any use of the death
penalty after such trials would violate international law (see overleaf).
PLEASE WRITE IMMEDIATELY in your own language:
-Express concern that the charges against Abd al Rahim al Nashiri have been
referred on for trial as
capital;
-Point out that international law prohibits the death penalty based on any
trial that has not met
the highest standards of fairness, and arguing that the military commission
trials do not meet such
standards;
-Urge that the military commissions be abandoned in favor of trials in US
District Court and that
pursuit of the death penalty be dropped in any case, whatever the trial forum;
-Condemn the USA's failure to respect international human rights law in the
case of 'Abd al Rahim al
Nashiri over the past nine years, heightening the need for rigorous respect for
human rights
principles now.
PLEASE SEND APPEALS BEFORE 28 NOVEMBER 2011 TO:
President
President Barack Obama
The White House, 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington DC 20500,
USA
Fax: 1 202 456 2461
Email: http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/
Salutation: Dear Mr. President
Secretary of Defense
The Honorable Leon Panetta
Secretary of Defense
1000 Defense Pentagon
Washington DC 20301-1000,
USA
Fax: 1 703 571 8951
Salutation: Dear Secretary of Defense
Please check with the AIUSA Urgent Action Office if sending appeals after the
above date.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
Despite being named on an indictment in US federal court only months after his
arrest in 2002, 'Abd
al Nashiri was not brought promptly before a judicial authority and brought to
trial without undue
delay, as required by international law. Instead he was detained in secret
until he was transferred
to Guantanamo in 2006. During his time in CIA custody, he was subjected to
torture, including by
"water-boarding", where the process of drowning the detainee is begun, as well
as other cruel,
inhuman or degrading treatment. Information released into the public domain
indicates 'Abd al Rahim
al Nashiri was also subjected to shackling, hooding and nudity as well as to a
number of
"unauthorized" techniques, including being threatened with a handgun and a
electric power drill,
"potentially injurious stress positions" and the use "of a stiff brush [used in
bathing] that was
intended to induce pain", and "standing on al-Nashiri's shackles, which
resulted in cuts and
bruises". He was held incommunicado in solitary confinement at undisclosed
locations for nearly four
years. No one has been brought to justice for the human rights violations,
including the crimes
under international law of torture and enforced disappearance, to which 'Abd al
Rahim al Nashiri and
others held in the CIA secret program were subjected.
In 2008, the Bush administration charged 'Abd al Rahim al Nashiri for trial by
military commission.
The charges were dismissed after President Barack Obama took office and ordered
a review of the
Guantanamo cases. In November 2009, the US Attorney General announced that the
case was being sent
back to the Department of Defense for prosecution by military commission.
The USA responded to the attacks of 11 September 2001 by developing a global
"war" framework under
which its interpretation of the laws of war would apply to the exclusion of
international human
rights law. Torture and other ill-treatment, enforced disappearance, secret
detainee transfers,
indefinite detention outside the criminal justice system, and unfair trials by
military commission
were among the practices that resulted. The military commission system is now
in its third version
since President Bush first established it by executive order in November 2001
(See: USA: Trials in
error. Third go at misconceived military commission experiment, July 2009,
http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR51/083/2009/en.) However, the
commissions still fail to
meet international fair trial standards. Among other flaws, they lack
independence, whether in
substance or appearance, from the political branches of government that have
authorized, condoned,
and blocked accountability and remedy for, human rights violations committed
against the very
category of detainees that will appear before them. The commissions are
creations of political
choice, not tribunals of demonstrably legitimate necessity, and turning to them
in this context
against these detainees contravenes international standards. Moreover, the
commissions are
discriminatory. If any Guantanamo detainee slated for prosecution was a US
national, he could not be
tried by these military commissions: Under US law he would have the right to a
civilian jury trial
in an ordinary federal court, not before a panel of US military officers
operating under rules and
procedures that provide a lesser standard of fairness. The same standard of
fair trial should be
applied to all, regardless of national origin: that is a fundamental principle
of human rights and
the rule of law.
The UN Human Rights Committee, established by the International Covenant on
Civil and Political
Rights (ICCPR) to oversee implementation of that treaty, has emphasized that
fair trial guarantees
are particularly important in cases leading to death sentences, and that "the
imposition of a
sentence of death upon conclusion of a trial, in which the provisions of
article 14 of the Covenant
have not been respected, constitutes a violation of the right to life (article
6 of the Covenant)."
In 2007, the UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human
rights and fundamental
freedoms called on the USA to disestablish the military commissions. In 2009,
the UN Special
Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions urged the USA not
to conduct any
capital prosecutions before military commissions.
Name(s): 'Abd al Rahim Hussayn Muhammed al Nashiri (m)
Issue(s): Death penalty, Legal concern
---------------------------------
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Amnesty International is a worldwide grassroots movement that promotes and
defends human rights.
This Urgent Action may be reposted if kept intact, including contact
information and stop action
date (if applicable). Thank you for your help with this appeal.
Urgent Action Network
Amnesty International USA
600 Pennsylvania Ave SE 5th fl
Washington DC 20003
Email: u...@aiusa.org
http://www.amnestyusa.org/uan
Phone: 202.509.8193
Fax: 202.675.8566
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END OF URGENT ACTION APPEAL
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