Civil liberties, targeting of Muslims tackled by American media

by William Fisher

Like President George Bush's nominee to be attorney general, White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales, the president's choice to head the Department of Homeland Security, Federal Judge Michael Chertoff, faced tough questions from some Democratic senators and most human rights advocates because of what they see as abuses of civil liberties during his service in the Department of Justice (DOJ).

Chertoff was assistant attorney general in charge of the DOJ's Criminal Division from 2001 to 2003, when Bush nominated him to be a federal judge. "Mike has shown a deep commitment to the cause of justice and an unwavering determination to protect the American people," Bush said. "Mike has also been a key leader in the war on terror." But with his nomination only days old, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the nation's leading human rights advocacy group, says it is "troubled that his public record suggests he sees the Bill of Rights as an obstacle to national security, rather than a guidebook for how to do security properly".

In its World Report 2005, Human Rights Watch said the Bush administration should appoint a special prosecutor to investigate the abuse of detainees at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison, and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to regain the United States' credibility around the world.

"Special prosecutors have been appointed for far lesser crimes," said Kenneth Roth, executive director of New York-based advocacy group. "All that's happened is a flurry of self-investigation," he added, as the group released its annual report on human rights in 60 countries. "There is an urgent need to (reinstate) the prohibition of torture and to redeem the United States' credibility."

The report was also critical of Egypt's human rights record which, it said, "showed little improvement during 2004". The government set up a National Council for Human Rights and appointed several respected independent activists to its board, but serious issues like routine torture of persons in detention and suppression of non-violent political dissent remain unaddressed. Emergency rule continues, providing the basis for arbitrary detention and trials before military and state security courts. Victims of torture and ill-treatment include not just political dissenters but also persons detained in ordinary criminal inquiries, men suspected of engaging in consensual homosexual conduct, and street children.

"Non-governmental organisations are subjected to stringent controls under the new law on associations, and the authorities arbitrarily reject the applications of several organisations to register as NGOs, as required by the law. Women and girls face systematic discrimination under personal status and other laws, and violence directed at women and girls frequently goes unpunished," Human Rights Watch said.

Another major US advocacy group, Human Rights First, welcomed the US supreme court's decision to reject the US government's policy of indefinitely detaining foreign nationals, whose home countries will not accept their return, in the United States. The court, in a 7-2 judgement written by Justice Antonin Scalia, held that non-citizens have the right to be free from indefinite detention. The court concluded that the statute relied on by the government to support the practice of indefinite detention only authorised detention for as long as "reasonably necessary".

The organisation said: "The decision of the supreme court today rejects one of the farther reaching assertions of administrative power by the Executive Branch. The ruling also honours the United States' commitments under international law."

Human Rights First, along with other leading human rights organisations, submitted a "friend of the court" brief in the case, arguing that the indefinite detention of non-citizens violated the United States' obligations under various international treaties to be free from arbitrary and indefinite detention.

Douglas Jehl and David Johnston wrote in The New York Times: "At the urging of the White House, congressional leaders scrapped a legislative measure last month that would have imposed new restrictions on the use of extreme interrogation measures by American intelligence officers, congressional officials say. The defeat of the proposal affects one of the most obscure arenas of the war on terrorism, involving the Central Intelligence Agency's secret detention and interrogation of top terror leaders like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, and about three dozen other senior members of Al Qaeda and its offshoots.

"The Senate had approved the new restrictions, by a 96-to-2 vote, as part of the intelligence reform legislation. They would have explicitly extended to intelligence officers a prohibition against torture or inhumane treatment, and would have required the CIA, as well as the Pentagon, to report to Congress about the methods they were using. But in intense closed-door negotiations, congressional officials said, four senior members from the House and Senate deleted the restrictions from the final bill after the White House expressed opposition."

Representatives of the Council on American-Islamic Relations - Southern California (CAIR-LA) and the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC) met with senior officials from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and its largest investigative arm, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). The meeting was designed to develop dialogue and communication between the American Muslim community and the two government agencies.

Concerns addressed at the meeting included the perceived lack of openness by ICE and DHS officials, targeting of Muslim immigrants and ways to enhance the nation's security without undermining civil liberties. Although DHS and ICE officials declined to discuss specific cases, the Muslim community's concerns about the detentions of Imam Wagdy Ghoneim and Abdul Jabbar Hamdan were brought to their attention.

The recent detentions of these local religious leaders and the dozens of complaints of harassment filed by American Muslim travellers, which include being unable to remove their names from the "No Fly List" repeated stops and interrogations at airports, exclusion from entry to the United States, and revocation of visas to enter the country for no stated reason (such as in the cases of Yusuf Islam and Dr Tariq Ramadan) have been of concern to the Islamic community.

This article was published in the Monday, January 17, 2005 edition of the Jordan Times. It is used here with permission.