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Bush Signs Law Creating Tribunals for Terror Suspects

By Roger Runningen and Jeffrey St.Onge
Bloomberg
October 17, 2006

Oct. 17 (Bloomberg) -- President George W. Bush signed legislation to allow the trial of suspected terrorists by military tribunals, and his administration immediately used the law to challenge suits by hundreds of GuantanamoBay detainees.

The government took its first action under the new Military Commissions Act, which Bush said ``provides a way to deliver justice to the terrorists'' captured after the Sept. 11 attacks. The American Civil Liberties Union said the law will make Guantanamo and other detention facilities a ``legal no-man's land.''

Among those who will be brought to trial under the law is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged Sept. 11 mastermind. He and 13 other terrorism suspects, who were labeled ``high value'' and had been held in secret overseas prisons operated by the Central Intelligence Agency, were transferred last month to the U.S. facility at the U.S. Navy Base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Shortly after Bush signed the measure, the Justice Department sent a letter to a U.S. appeals court in Washington saying the new law strips hundreds of other Guantanamo detainees of their right to a court hearing to challenge their confinement. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit is considering whether to dismiss the suits by detainees who haven't been charged with war crimes.

In addition to setting up military commissions to try suspected terrorists, the law gives the president wide latitude to interpret the Geneva Conventions in deciding what interrogation techniques would be permissible.

Water Boarding

Senator John McCain, a key architect of the bill, said the intent is to outlaw practices such as simulated drowning -- known as water boarding -- sleep deprivation and putting detainees in stress positions. The Arizona Republican's opposition to the president's original proposal for the tribunals forced the administration to compromise on its provisions.

The law continued to draw criticism from some Democrats and groups such as the ACLU and Amnesty International.

ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero, in a statement, called the law ``unconstitutional and un-American.'' Amnesty International said it would let the U.S. hold suspects indefinitely without charge or trial.

Under the law, detainees who haven't been charged with a crime can no longer go to federal court to contest whether they are being properly held as ``enemy combatants.'' Instead, they must go through a military review, with a limited right of appeal to the D.C. Circuit.

Fewer Rights

Lawyers for more than 200 Guantanamo detainees say such military reviews would provide fewer rights than a federal court suit, and that the Constitution doesn't allow the U.S. to take away their right to challenge their detention by asking a federal judge to issue a writ of habeas corpus.

``By trying to stamp out any prospect for fair hearings, the president makes us no safer today than we were yesterday,'' said Osman Handoo, a Washington lawyer representing some of the detainees.

The Guantanamo detainees won a 2004 Supreme Court ruling allowing them to challenge their detention in federal court. After the cases returned to a federal trial court in Washington, two judges issued conflicting rulings on whether the inmates could pursue their claims. The D.C. Circuit hadn't ruled on the cases when Congress approved the new law in September.

Also today, Osama bin Laden's former driver, Salim Ahmed Hamdan, asked a U.S. court in Washington to consider whether the provision stripping suspected terrorists of their right to challenge their detention is unconstitutional.

Supreme Court Ruling

Hamdan, who is accused of conspiracy, won a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in June that Congress hadn't authorized the planned military tribunals. That ruling led Bush to seek enactment of the measure he signed today.

Republicans highlighted Democrats' opposition to the new law. House Majority Leader John Boehner, an Ohio Republican, said in a statement that ``Democrats' partisan opposition to this program, at the urging of the radical leftist element of their party, provides further proof that they continue to put politics ahead of addressing the security concerns of the American people.''

Democratic Representative Edward Markey of Massachusetts said the law would endanger U.S. personnel overseas who are captured by the nation's enemies.

Protesters

While Bush was signing the law, a group of protesters demonstrated outside the White House fence chanting ``stop torture'' and ``shame on Congress, shame on Bush.'' At least 16 people were arrested when they blocked an entrance to the White House grounds, said Scott Fear, a spokesman for the U.S. Park Police.

``Over the past few months the debate over this bill has been heated, and the questions raised can seem complex,'' Bush said today. ``Every member of Congress who voted for this bill has helped our nation rise to the task that history has given us.''

The Senate gave final approval to the bill 65-34 on Sept. 28 and the House endorsed it the following day, 250-170.

Administration spokesman Tony Snow said suspects won't be brought to trial immediately. ``I think it's a month or two, at least,'' because of the need to set up legal procedures and for suspects to obtain attorneys, he said. He also declined to predict how soon CIA interrogations would resume or what ``precise questioning techniques'' would be used.

``Some of these people are so bad their host governments don't want them back,'' Snow said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Roger Runningen in Washington at rrunningen@bloomberg.net ; Jeff St.Onge in Washington jstonge@bloomberg.net

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