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AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL

PRESS RELEASE

 

Decade of human rights damage: EU must press USA to close Guantánamo

 

(Brussels, 11 January 2012) Today marks the tenth anniversary of the US detention centre at Guantánamo Bay. To coincide with this date, Amnesty International has urged the European Union to press the US Government to abolish indefinite detention without criminal trial, disavow its doctrine of global and pervasive war, and fully embrace standards of international law.

 

“Ten years after its inception, Guantánamo remains open. This means the US has been committing a decade-long assault on the most fundamental human rights principles”, said Nicolas Beger, Director of Amnesty International’s European Institutions Office. “The EU opposes the US ‘war on terror’ doctrine, preferring to combat terrorism through international and criminal law. So it’s time the EU publicly reaffirmed its continued opposition to Guantánamo and all its associated human rights abuses.”

 

Amnesty International has asked the EU to:-

 

• Express concern at the continued detention without charge or criminal trial of scores of detainees at Guantánamo, including Abu Zubaydah

• Challenge the US Government’s decision to use military commissions to try detainees and pursue the death penalty against six of them, including Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri 

• Express its commitment to ensuring accountability for EU countries’ involvement in human rights violations under US-led counter-terrorism operations, and seek assurances of US cooperation with all EU efforts to ensure accountability for violations on European soil

 

Amnesty International’s comprehensive new report: USA Guantánamo: A decade of damage to human rights, lists ten ‘anti-human rights messages’ which it believes the United States persists in transmitting to the world for as long as the prison remains open. 

 

For interviews or further comment, please contact:-

 

Peter Clarke 

Media & Communications Officer

European Institutions Office

Amnesty International

Tel:+32 (0) 2 548 2773

pclarke@amnesty.eu