WASHINGTON, March 23: The human rights organization Amnesty International has expressed its dissatisfaction with the rules announced earlier this week for US military tribunals and said the original presidential order authorizing the tribunals is itself flawed.
In a statement released on Friday, Amnesty said the operating guidelines for trials by executive military commission, issued by the US Secretary of Defence, “have thrown into stark relief the fundamental defects of the Military Order signed by President Bush on Nov 13, 2001 .... That the Pentagon has paid lip service to due process in its commission guidelines cannot disguise the fact that any trial before these executive bodies would violate the USA’s international obligations.”
The organization repeated its call for the military order to be rescinded, and pointed out the discriminatory nature of the order, which stipulates that US nationals would not be tried by military courts even if they were accused of the same offence as foreigners.
The tribunals have been set up to try Al Qaeda/Taliban men arrested or likely to be arrested by the US.
Amnesty said there would be no right of appeal from the tribunals to an independent and impartial court established by law. Instead, there would be a review by a three-member panel appointed by the defence secretary.
“We note the Pentagon’s rules include the presumption of innocence,” Amnesty said. “However, this guarantee has been undermined by a pattern of public commentary on the presumed guilt of the Guantánamo detainees by the very officials that control the commissions.”
