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The second of two major defense budget bills has been okayed by the House Appropriations Committee, providing $706 billion in funds for the Pentagon for fiscal year 2022. The bill includes plans for closing the Guantanamo Bay prison and ending the 2001 and 2002 authorizations for use of military force (AUMF).

The House committee approved the bill on a party-line vote of 33-23, overriding the objections by Republicans that the bill’s 1.4% increase was too small. However, Democrats said they disapproved of the large spending bill and only advanced it to submit it to a wider debate in the full House chamber.

“We just spend too much on what is defined as traditional defense, and many of us in the country and many of us in Congress would like to redefine defense,” said Rep. Mark Pocan (D-WI), according to The Hill. “What’s actually in the defense of this country? It’s not in defense contractors, but it’s things like pandemics and climate change and other items.”

The appropriations bill is one of two bills that comprise the National Defense Authorization Act, with the other being the authorization bill, which sets the spending priorities. The NDAA is expected to be heard by the committee on July 21.

The bill includes several important amendments added by the committee, including two ending the 2001 and 2002 AUMFs, which Congress created to authorize both the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as military operations in undeclared war zones if they were against al-Qaeda or forces aligned with the terrorist group, such as the Somali group al-Shabaab.

Last month, the House also voted to repeal the 2002 and 1991 AUMFs - although US President Joe Biden proved he could still order airstrikes in Syria and Iraq without them just days later by claiming self-defense instead.

The bill also says its funds cannot be used to operate the Guantanamo Bay detention center after September 30, 2022, or to “support or facilitate offensive military operations conducted by the Saudi-led coalition against the Houthis in the war in Yemen.”

Interestingly, it also requires the secretaries of Defense and State to furnish Salvadoran authorities with “all relevant information and documents” relating to the 1981 El Mozote Massacre, in which nearly 1,000 villagers were murdered, half of them children, by the US-trained Atlacatl Battalion. Last year, Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele blocked the probe from going forward, claiming the country’s records had been destroyed, but hearings related to charges against 17 Salvadoran military officers moved ahead this past May, which might go to trial later this year.

It would also provide Israel with $150 million to buy new Iron Dome air defense systems, which it uses to intercept rockets fired from Gaza and Lebanon. Israel fired thousands of interceptors during the 11-day war with Gaza in May, and many rockets escaped their defenses and struck Israeli towns, killing at least 13 people. The money is just part of $500 million being funneled to Israel for missile defense programs, including the Arrow missile system.

In terms of new construction, the bill provides for eight new US Navy warships, including two Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, a Constellation-class frigate, a Columbia-class ballistic missile submarine, two Virginia-class attack submarines, and more funds for the programs associated with the Ford-class carriers and Zumwalt-class destroyers. It also provides for 85 F-35 Joint Strike Fighters and 12 more F/A-18E/F Super Hornet fighters. 

 

Read more:

https://sputniknews.com/military/202107141083386234-706-billion-pentagon-funding-bill-advanced-by-house-committee-would-close-gitmo-end-2001-aumf/

 

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Military prosecutors have been struggling to bring the 9/11 case to trial, which has been mired in years of pre-trial hearings since the arraignment of the suspects in May 2011.

Army Brig. Gen. Mark S. Martins, the chief prosecutor of the alleged perpetrators of the 9/11 terror attacks, who served throughout the Obama and Trump administrations, is retiring less than two months before the 20th anniversary of the deadly events of 2001.

The abrupt departure comes as Pentagon officials are gearing up for the first hearings since February 2020, set for September, in the problem-plagued trial of five men accused of plotting the hijackings that killed 2,976 people in New York at the Pentagon and in a Pennsylvania field.

The announcement was made in a message to the families of the victims of the four coordinated attacks by the terrorist group Al-Qaeda* by Karen Loftus, director of the prosecution team's Victim Witness Assistance Programme.

Revealed on 8 July and cited by NPR, the move throws into question the likelihood that the trial schedule will be met.

No clarification was offered regarding the reasons behind the early exit of the prosecutor, which comes as a surprise given that Martins had repeatedly delayed his retirement and was scheduled to remain in the position until 2023. Ms. Loftus said General Martins chose to retire “in the best interests of the ongoing cases.”

It was added that the timing offered “an ideal window to identify a successor” as proceedings are “finally in view again for all of our cases following the pandemic-driven hiatus.”

Defence officials were cited by the outlet as saying a board was likely to be assembled to select a new chief prosecutor, while General Martins’s civilian deputy, Michael J. O’Sullivan, would serve as acting chief prosecutor. Martins himself has not offered an official comment.

Mired in Pretrial Proceedings

The administration of then-President Barack Obama opted to pursue the Sept. 11 death-penalty case against Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and the four accused accomplices of the attacks at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, rather than in a federal court.

However, since the men’s arraignment in May 2011 after their captures in Pakistan in 2002 and 2003, the process has been beleaguered by setbacks and protracted pretrial proceedings.

 

Besides the frequent turnover of judges – two of the three military officers who presided in the case retired from service, while another left the bench to take up a position in the Marine Corps – the sides had to contend with questions related to the ongoing legal debate. The latter pertained to whether evidence obtained through torture of the defendants in CIA prisons before their 2006 transfers to Guantánamo could be used at trial.

The Justice Department ordered FBI agents to question the accused again at Guantánamo in 2007 in an effort to obtain confessions “untainted by torture” after their stint in CIA custody. Defence lawyers have been challenging FBI interrogations in lengthy court proceedings.

The coronavirus crisis complicated efforts as it cut off most access to Guantánamo. Furthermore, one military court judge quit last year after just two weeks on the job. The chief defence counsel in the case, Marine Brig. Gen. John Baker, is also retiring in November.

 

Read more:

https://sputniknews.com/us/202107111083361204-chief-prosecutor-in-911-trial-quits-abruptly-in-fresh-setback-to-beleaguered-case/

 

 

See also: https://www.yourdemocracy.net.au/drupal/node/13344

 

 

If I was not sarcastic (or is it the reverse) I would say that the US government is waiting for the (non)accused to die in Guantanamo of old age... Exposing these guys to the spotlight of Justice could have a tendency to reveal a lot of the failings and much shenanigans by the US government — hence the delays over and over... The same is happening to this guy below:

 

 

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President Joe Biden’s administration has transferred its first detainee from the US military prison at Guantanamo Bay, a Moroccan man who had been imprisoned since 2002, bringing the population at the facility down to 39.

Set up to house foreign suspects following the September 11, 2001, attacks on New York and Washington, the prison came to symbolise the excesses of the US “war on terror” because of harsh interrogation methods that critics say amounted to torture.

Although Donald Trump kept the prison open during his four years in the White House, Mr Biden has vowed to close it.

 

Abdul Latif Nasir, who is Moroccan and 56 years old, was repatriated to Morocco. He had been cleared for release in 2016.

 

Read more:

https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/2021/07/19/moroccan-detainee-transferred-guantanamo-bay/

 

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As the United States imposes new Cuba sanctions, citing human rights abuses, we look at the U.S. military prison in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, a notorious gulag that President Biden himself has called an “advertisement for creating terror.” This month, the first Guantánamo Bay prisoner to be released under the Biden administration, ​​Abdul Latif Nasser, returned to his home country of Morocco after nearly two decades of being held without charge even though he was cleared for release in 2016. There are 39 other prisoners still at Guantánamo, nearly two decades after the start of the U.S. war on terror. To discuss efforts to close the notorious prison and repatriate the remaining detainees, we are joined by Nasser’s lawyer Mark Maher of Reprieve and Gary Thompson, lawyer for former Guantánamo prisoner Ravil Mingazov, who is currently being held in a UAE prison after being released from Guantánamo in 2017, where he was held without charge for 15 years. “If there was ever a right and just time to be releasing these men, this is the time to do it,” says Maher.

 

Read more:

https://www.democracynow.org/2021/7/27/guantanamo_closure_prisoner_repatriation

 

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Paintings of Guantanamo Inmates Display Humanity of Those Locked UpBy Jeremy Kuzmarov 

Guantánamo Bay prison is a monstrosity where hundreds of suspected terrorists have been held and tortured for years, many without being charged of any crime.

To keep their humanity, many of the inmates produced paintings that were featured at a May 2 screening premiere event in Beverly Hills of I Am Gitmo, a feature film about the human rights abuses that occurred at Guantánamo.

The paintings are also currently being spotlighted in Burbank, California, at Cinema Libre Studio, which produced I Am Gitmo, and have been shown at the European Parliament.

Directed by Philippe Diaz, whose previous film credits include a documentary on poverty narrated by Martin Sheen, I Am Gitmo, spotlights the case of an Egyptian who was tortured for years at Guantánamo after being captured in a bounty program in which the U.S. military paid Afghan villagers $2,000 to $25,000 to turn in terrorist suspects.

The CIA never checked on the guilt of these suspects.

The U.S. military fabricated evidence to make it look like captives taken in the bounty program were guilty while telling the public that Guantánamo Bay housed the worst terrorists.

After 22 years of operation, only four inmates have been convicted of any crimes. The facility today still houses more than 30 inmates, many of whom are geriatrics suffering from serious mental health deterioration owing to the years of isolation and torture.

In part as a form of therapy and a way to pass their time productively, detainees began to make art almost as soon as they arrived at Guantánamo, carving designs in Styrofoam cups and using tea powder for ink.

Initially, the art was destroyed. The work that survives was made after the detainees were permitted to take an art class and give some of their pieces to their lawyers.

Each work outside the camp bore a stamp reading “Approved by U.S. Forces” on its reverse, signaling that it was scrutinized by authorities before it was cleared to leave Guantánamo. Such artworks have brought worldwide attention to Guantánamo in multiple exhibitions since 2017 (visit www.hrtlaw.org/art or www.artfromguantanamo.com for more information).

The artists represented were all cleared for release from Guantánamo; none was ever charged with a crime.

Most of the paintings are non-political, though one (featured at the beginning of this article) has an American flag covered by prison bars, and another, by Yemeni Sabri al-Qurashi, depicted a scene from Guantánamo.

 

READ MORE: https://covertactionmagazine.com/2024/05/30/paintings-of-guantanamo-inmates-display-humanity-of-those-locked-up/

 

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