New legal action launched today, 11th January 2018, on the 16th anniversary of Guantánamo’s opening – Reprieve, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), and co-counsel have filed a mass challenge to Donald Trump’s continued detention of prisoners at Guantánamo Bay.
Our two organisations lead the fight for the rights of Guantanamo detainees and between us have freed more prisoners from Guantanamo than any other organisation in thew world. This fresh legal action argues that continued detention is unconstitutional, because any legitimate rationale for initially detaining these men has long since expired. Some of the men participating in today’s flegal action have been detained in Guantánamo for nearly 16 years without charge or trial. Among them are Reprieve clients Abdul Latif Nasser and Towfiq Bihani – who have been approved for transfer, but narrowly missed their chance at release in the final days of the Obama administration. Since Guantánamo opened, it’s been clear to all – including U.S. officials – that the detainees were being held on the basis of mistakes, faulty evidence, and forced ‘confessions’. The U.S. has had 16 years to build a case against these men, and yet 28 of 41 prisoners are held without charge or a trial of any kind – a shocking violation of America’s founding principles. If the President won’t close Guantánamo, then the other branches of government must take action instead to finally restore the rule of law.As authoritarian abuses are on the rise worldwide, help us push back
