[news] Reading Harry Potter in Guantánamo

[Mostly Water - "Canadian" and International alternative news feed]

The prisoners at Guantánamo Bay—or Azkaban, as one of my clients, a Harry Potter fan, calls it—have had no access to a hearing in a court of law. Instead, Guantánamo’s inmates are subjected to two kangaroo procedures: Combatant Status Review Tribunals (CSRTs) and Administrative Review Boards (ARBs).

[One prisoner] sees parallels between George W. Bush and J.K. Rowling’s arch-villain, Voldemort. Guantánamo is the real-world equivalent of Azkaban, the cheerless prison guarded by the soulless “tormentors.” It seems almost natural that fact and fantasy collide in Guantánamo, the prison camp dreamed up by the Bush administration lawyers. Checks and balances, constitutional protections and longstanding legal traditions all dissolve before their fanciful "unitary executive theory."

  


[read more][1]

    [1]: http://mostlywater.org/reading_harry_potter_in_guantanamo

URL: http://mostlywater.org/reading_harry_potter_in_guantanamo