Preaching to other countries by Britain and the US is ‘hypocritical and hollow’ when Camp Bastion and Guantanamo are in direct breach of international law, Jeremy Corbyn, a Labour, MP told RT.
RT: Mr. Corbyn, is it right to compare Camp Bastion to
Guantanamo Bay?
Jeremy Corbyn: The principles are very much the same, that
is that people are collected or arrested as enemy combatants and
for very long periods not allowed normal judicial process. With
Guantanamo Bay, and I think the legacy of 2001, camp
Bastion and the extraordinary rendition process is something that
is going to live for a very long time, international law has been
seriously undermined by Britain and the USA in their behavior
over Afghanistan for the past 12 years.
RT: I guess not only breaking international law but
human rights violations in these facilities have occurred, in
Guantanamo we know that the detainees are starving themselves to
be heard, do we know what is happening to those at camp
Bastion?
JC: Well, it’s very difficult to find out exactly what is
happening there and also what the nationality of some of the
prisoners actually is. There is no longer any rendition going on
from either of the bases in Afghanistan to Guantanamo Bay, but
there seems to be considerable numbers held at both prisons and
its very unclear whether the handing over of the bases to the
Afghan authorities when the main forces of Britain and the USA
withdraw next year, is actually going to be complete or whether
there will be a security facility retained by the USA and
Britain, which will include the prison facilities. What we do
know is that the preaching of international law by Britain and
the USA and others seems to me very hypocritical and hollow when,
on the question of the past rendition of soldiers, not soldiers
but prisoners rather, to Guantanamo Bay but also the indefinite
detention of people in both these bases who may well be Afghan
people or may well be people from neighboring countries.
RT: We know that President Obama has said that he wants
to shut down the Guantanamo Bay prison, but those words have just
been met with skepticism now, what do we know of the British
authorities, are they planning to return these prisoners to the
Afghan authorities when they leave Afghanistan?
JC: Well, I’ve had a number of meetings with the British
government and I’ve raised the issue in parliament about British
nationals who were held in Guantanamo Bay, all of whom have now
been released and are now British residents, these are foreign
nationals with the right of residence in Britain, the most
prominent of which Shaker Aamer who is still held in
Guantanamo Bay and is on hunger strike at the present time. The
official position of the British government is that Guantanamo
should be closed down and that all the prisoners should either be
put on trial or released, that is its official position.
President Obama claimed in his first election campaign he was
going to close down Guantanamo Bay, he said as much in his second
election campaign and here we are 5 years later, it’s still up
and running, he claims or his administration claim that they
can’t get it passed in the house and the senate in the USA and
that’s the problem. I find it quite extraordinary that a major
power like the USA should flout international law in this way,
and I think we have to redouble our efforts to get Guantanamo Bay
closed down and the rule of international law asserted.
RT: Just briefly, what do these kinds of prisons tell
us about this US-led war that Britain was also involved in, in
Afghanistan?
JC: Well it shows an utter contempt for the alleged
independence of the Afghan government. The Afghan government is
supposed to be in charge of the country and there are British and
American and many other soldiers allegedly fighting to protect
this government, they claim they can’t hand prisoners over to
this government because they’ll be tortured but instead they’re
held illegally in these two bases, What we need is transparency,
the right of visiting, the right of representation, and to either
release the prisoners or put them on trial. It is simply not
right that prisoners should be held indefinitely without charge
or trial.
This article originally appeared on: RT