The Issues Explained:
International law comes under siege by U.S. administration

On Thursday, Sept. 6, President Bush finally acknowledged that the CIA operates a network of secret prisons abroad for holding key suspects in the war on terror. Its islands are of tight security, keeping 14,000 detainees beyond the reach of established law. He added that 14 “high-profile” suspected terrorists were transferred from those prisons to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Some of the detainees have been in CIA custody. Among them are said to be people responsible for the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole in 2000 in Yemen and the 1998 attacks on U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, in addition to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
“It has been necessary to move these individuals to an environment where they can be held secretly, questioned by experts and, when appropriate, prosecuted for terrorist acts,” Bush said in a speech to an audience filled with the families of loved ones killed in the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.

The 1949 Geneva Conventions were based on principles of Henri Dunant, who was motivated by the horrors he witnessed at the Battle of Solferino in 1859. The Conventions consist of four treaties, which set the standards for international law in times of war.

"If you just look at how we are perceived in the world and the kind of criticism we have taken over Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and renditions,” Colin Powell, former U.S. secretary of state, said in an interview, “whether we believe it or not, people are now starting to question whether we’re following our own high standards.”

According to The Washington Post, while it is not clear exactly what techniques the Bush administration wishes to enforce in its secret prisons, sources have said previous methods used include nakedness, prolonged sensory assault and deprivation, the imposition of “stress” positions, and water submersion to the verge of drowning. Bush has said none of those amounts to torture.

In February 2002, Bush went so far as to say the U.S. didn’t need to abide by the Geneva Conventions with its prisoners in Afghanistan and Iraq. Yet, in speeches after the Abu Ghraib abuses were made public through pictures of torture, the administration acted they had no idea why these abuses happened. Reports came out in 2003, that Donald Rumsfeld, secretary of defense, authorized the torture methods used.

It seems that what the global community regards as torture, the administration disagrees. If the U.S. goes against these internationally accepted principles while other nations abide by them, its image abroad will be further tarnished. The U.S. must set an example.

College students should pay attention to news like this and keep it in mind when they vote. This is a serious matter especially during a time of war.

What if a country like North Korea wants to redefine or “clarify” Geneva Conventions provisions prohibiting “outrages against personal dignity” and “humiliating and degrading treatment” of prisoners. What happens then? Does the administration step in and say no, you cannot do that when they are doing the exact thing?

—Nicholas Ballasy