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Obama: Guantanamo policies must accord with due process, international law

By Bernard Hibbitts (editor) and University of Pittsburgh School of Law students.

[JURIST] US President Barack Obama reiterated his position that US policies governing the detention and interrogation of Guantanamo Bay detainees should comport with due process and international law requirements in a Sunday interview  with 60 Minutes. Obama said that polices of the former Bush administration, which gave less deference to these norms, did not effectively help the US bring terrorists to justice but instead generated anti-American sentiment abroad. He said that terrorism suspects would still have to be treated seriously, that they were specifically not due Miranda rights, and that the country could not release individuals who still post a threat to the US. Obama said that despite these concerns, he believed detainees' treatment could effectively be governed under existing US and international regimes. Obama's remarks came in response to earlier criticism  by former vice president Dick Cheney of Obama's call to close Guantanamo by 2010. In January, Obama issued an executive order freezing the military commission system, calling for the review of US judicial policy towards the detainees, and directing the closure of Guantanamo within one year. The Department of Justice has also more recently eliminated the use of the term "enemy combatant" in a symbolic departure from Bush administration policies.

Full post as published by JURIST - The Paper Chase on March 23, 2009 (boomark / email).