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Title: Pentagon to apply Geneva Conventions to all detainees in military custody: FT
Source:
Jurist (Financial Times)
URL Source: http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/papercha ... o-apply-geneva-conventions.php
Published: Jul 11, 2006
Author: Jurist
Post Date: 2006-07-11 10:35:45 by aristeides
Keywords: None
Views: 64
Comments: 8
Pentagon to apply Geneva Conventions to all detainees in military custody: FT Jaime Jansen at 8:00 AM ET [JURIST] The US military has decided to apply the Geneva Conventions [ICRC materials] to all detainees held in US military custody around the world, according to Tuesday's Financial Times. The move marks a sharp reversal from a previous policy classifying detainees as "enemy combatants" outside the protections of Article 3 [text] of the Geneva Conventions. The provision, often called Common Article 3 as it is common to all four Geneva Conventions, prohibits torture and other inhumane treatment and mandates basic legal rights - "all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples" - at trial before a "regularly constituted court." Deputy Secretary of Defense Gordon England [official profile] reportedly told senior military officials in a memo on Friday that Common Article 3 would apply to all detainees in military custody. Gordon's memo follows last month's US Supreme Court ruling in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld [text], where the Court struck down [JURIST report] military commissions as currently constituted for Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archives] detainees, ruling that commission structures and procedures violate both the Geneva Conventions and the Uniform Code of Military Justice [text]. The Court also rejected the government's argument that Hamdan, a Guantanamo Bay detainee, was not entitled to Geneva Convention protections because he was not part of a uniformed enemy, ruling instead that the Geneva Conventions apply to the war on terror [JURIST op-ed]. Though the new Pentagon policy applies to all detainees held in military custody, it will not apply to any prisoners outside of the military detention system, including any prisoners held in alleged secret CIA prisons [COE materials; JURIST report]. The Financial Times has more. 10:19 AM ET - White House Press Secretary Tony Snow confirmed Tuesday morning that Common Article 3 will be applied to all detainees held in military custody, but refuted the characterization that England's memo reflects a reversal of policy. Snow said that Defense Department manuals already require that detainees be treated humanely. AP has more.
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#1. To: aristeides (#0)
Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia.
huh. guess they just found out about it eh? nothing gets a man to be moral than the fear of losing his own hide. such shining stars of righteousness....rather like lancelot riding in on a garbage scow.
'We shall no longer hang on to the tails of public opinion, or to a non-existent authority, on matters utterly unknown and strange. We shall gradually become experts ourselves in the mastery of the knowledge of the future.' ~ Wilhelm Reich
tony snowjob.
'We shall no longer hang on to the tails of public opinion, or to a non-existent authority, on matters utterly unknown and strange. We shall gradually become experts ourselves in the mastery of the knowledge of the future.' ~ Wilhelm Reich
For violations of the Geneva Conventions before the Supreme Court ruled in Hamdan, administration officials could use the defense that they did not know that the law required them to follow them. After Hamdan, that defense is no longer available to them.
Anyone that needs any "defense" to treat prisoners in a humane manner, is a douche-bag and should be dealt with accordingly.
ah, the eddie haskell defense... dog ate my homework...forgot torturing was bad. we were gonna do it, but now that theres this law and all. people who need laws to do the right thing are inherently immoral.
'We shall no longer hang on to the tails of public opinion, or to a non-existent authority, on matters utterly unknown and strange. We shall gradually become experts ourselves in the mastery of the knowledge of the future.' ~ Wilhelm Reich
Oh, I agree. But bureaucrats can much more easily oppose a policy when they can use the argument that following the policy will expose everybody to the danger of jail (and, in this case, because some deaths resulted, even to execution!)
Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia. If it isn't a reversal then why the announcement?
Tony Snow ... refuted the characterization that England's memo reflects a reversal of policy
I've already said too much.
#2. To: aristeides (#0)
#3. To: MUDDOG (#1)
#4. To: gengis gandhi (#2)
#5. To: aristeides (#4)
After Hamdan, that defense is no longer available to them.
#6. To: aristeides (#4)
#7. To: gengis gandhi (#6)
#8. To: MUDDOG (#1)
Tony Snow ... refuted the characterization that England's memo reflects a reversal of policy
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