UN report charges abuse at Guantanamo

As reported here, "experts" from the UN Human Rights Commission (that group that has included Syria and Libya, for crying out loud!) - who refused to go look in person - have issued a report alleging "torture" and "abuse" of detainees at the prison in Guantanamo Bay, basing their report on news accounts (and we all know how "unbiased" the MSM is, right?), and notes made by attorneys for the detainees (and we all know how honest and ethical lawyers are, too, right?).

Among the allegations of "torture" and "abuse" are such horrific things as force feeding detainees who were on a hunger strike, and prolonged solitary confinement. Oh, my. Let's all wring our hands and sit in a circle and sing Kumbaya over these "horrific" examples of "torture" and "abuse".

I have one question for the UN. Where were you during the 1960's and 1970's, when US POW's were really being tortured in the "Hanoi Hilton", at the hands of the North Vietnamese? When our guys were being beaten on a daily basis; arms tied at the elbows behind their backs, and then hoisted off the ground until their shoulders became dislocated; when electrodes, connected to either hand operated generators or car batteries, were attached to various portions of their anatomy, sending electrical current through their bodies; when they were only given a small portion of rice once (if that!) a day; when medical treatment of broken bones, open wounds and diseases was denied. Where were you?!

U.S. officials rejected the draft report, saying the experts who wrote it made many errors and treated statements from detainees' lawyers as fact.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said the United States would not address many of the claims until the final report is released, but defended U.S. practices generally. He focused on the experts' refusal to go to Guantanamo.

"When people hear these press reports about these outcomes and when they actually view the final report, I would urge them to look at it in the context of the fact that nobody who wrote this report actually went to Guantanamo," McCormack said.

The UN "experts" also dismissed U.S. claims that the war on terror constitutes an armed conflict, and said they would not classify the detainees as "enemy combatants." If this isn't an armed conflict, then what is it? A "police matter"? That's how the previous administration viewed it, and the result of that head in the sand naiveté was the attacks carried out on 9/11!

I have news for the UN. This IS an armed conflict, the detainees ARE enemy combatants, and as such are NOT due the protections of the Geneva Convention, no matter what the UN says, or wishes, otherwise!