The American prison at Guantanamo Bay, which continues to operate outside the parameters of international law, has over the years continued to serve as terrifying proof of the injustice that has been spread in the name of the war on terrorism. Case after case and story after story out of 'Gitmo' has been one of American impunity, injustice and racial profiling. One of these stories is of Saifullah Paracha, a Pakistani prisoner at Gitmo for nearly two decades, who has been finally released without ever having been charged for any crime. The US authorities released Guantanamo Bay’s oldest prisoner – Paracha – last week and he is now back home in Pakistan. He was arrested two years after the September 11, 2001 attacks in the US on the accusation of being an Al-Qaeda sympathizer. The US authorities suspected him of financing the jihadist group but never brought any formal charges against him.
The US military prison in Cuba once housed hundreds of suspected militants captured following the attacks, so the first question is about how a country can fill its prison on the basis of mere suspicion. The second question is why it had taken so long for the release of an accused who was never formally charged. This entire episode shows the arrogance of the US authorities who never consider themselves answerable to anyone. This is not the only case of such unlawful detention as there were hundreds who spent years in jail without being charged. There have been countless reports of how prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, at prisons in Afghanistan and Iraq and at black sites around the world were subjected to waterboarding, rectally fed, deprived of sleep, made to stand for days on end and threatened with rape and death. There is little doubt that the US has been guilty of heinous war crimes, with every one of these prisoners picked up illegally and more than one in five found to be unconnected with terrorism. Keeping uncharged prisoners for that long – or for any extended period for that matter – is not only an ethical and moral issue, it is also in contravention of international laws of human rights.
The US should have cleared out all uncharged prisoners long ago; instead it kept lingering on and wasted precious years of many innocent people. And it was assisted in its torture regime by allies who willingly handed over suspects in return for money. In fact, the ‘war on terror’ unleashed a rather depraved criminality of the superpower and the subservient nature of those dependent on it for money. It is noteworthy that there are still 35 people being held at Guantanamo. The US must finally shut down this notorious prison that has become a sign of horror for many around the world. In the past 20 years, successive American governments have promised to close the prison down but such promises have remained hollow. It is time to end this chapter of injustice once and for all.