Prime Minister Howard should spend a year at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, says former detainee Mamdouh Habib, who claims inmates are subject to torture, electric shock and beatings.Speaking at a Sydney rally to mark five years since the US detention centre for terrorist suspects opened in Cuba, Mr Habib today called on the Federal Government to lobby for the release David Hicks, the only Australian remaining at Guantanamo.
"David Hicks (has spent) five years in Guantanamo Bay. Who keeps him in Guantanamo Bay? I blame the Government,'' Mr Habib told about 100 protesters gathered outside Sydney's Town Hall. "The Government, they are kidnapping people and sending them overseas. We are Australian citizens and Australia is our home.
"If he (Mr Howard) doesn't like it, he has to go there to Guantanamo Bay and try it for one year and he can come and tell us how he feels.'' Mr Habib was arrested in Pakistan in October 2001, accused of training with terrorist organisation al-Qaeda. He was freed from Guantanamo in January 2005.
Mr Habib told the rally the Federal Government was to blame for Hicks' five-year detention. ''(The government is) taking people overseas and then the torture and the electric shock and the beating,'' he said. Hicks, a 31-year-old Adelaide-born Muslim convert, has been held at Guantanamo Bay since January 2002, a month after being captured with Taliban forces in Afghanistan during the US invasion in December 2001. He had previously pleaded not guilty to charges of conspiracy, attempted murder and aiding the enemy. But following a US Supreme Court ruling in June, declaring illegal the military tribunals set up to try Hicks and other Guantanamo Bay inmates, those charges were dropped.
Other speakers at today's protest, organised by the Stop The War Coalition, criticised last night's announcement by US President George Bush that 21,500 extra troops would be sent to Iraq. Alex Bainbridge from the Stop the War Coalition said the invasion of Iraq was "illegal and unjust''.
Pip Hinman, from the Socialist Alliance, labelled Mr Howard and Attorney-General Philip Ruddock "war criminals'' and said Mr Bush's decision would not help solve the problems in Iraq. "We know it is not going to solve anything at all,'' she said. "We know it will result in the death of thousands more Iraqis.
Source: News.com.au
"David Hicks (has spent) five years in Guantanamo Bay. Who keeps him in Guantanamo Bay? I blame the Government,'' Mr Habib told about 100 protesters gathered outside Sydney's Town Hall. "The Government, they are kidnapping people and sending them overseas. We are Australian citizens and Australia is our home.
"If he (Mr Howard) doesn't like it, he has to go there to Guantanamo Bay and try it for one year and he can come and tell us how he feels.'' Mr Habib was arrested in Pakistan in October 2001, accused of training with terrorist organisation al-Qaeda. He was freed from Guantanamo in January 2005.
Mr Habib told the rally the Federal Government was to blame for Hicks' five-year detention. ''(The government is) taking people overseas and then the torture and the electric shock and the beating,'' he said. Hicks, a 31-year-old Adelaide-born Muslim convert, has been held at Guantanamo Bay since January 2002, a month after being captured with Taliban forces in Afghanistan during the US invasion in December 2001. He had previously pleaded not guilty to charges of conspiracy, attempted murder and aiding the enemy. But following a US Supreme Court ruling in June, declaring illegal the military tribunals set up to try Hicks and other Guantanamo Bay inmates, those charges were dropped.
Other speakers at today's protest, organised by the Stop The War Coalition, criticised last night's announcement by US President George Bush that 21,500 extra troops would be sent to Iraq. Alex Bainbridge from the Stop the War Coalition said the invasion of Iraq was "illegal and unjust''.
Pip Hinman, from the Socialist Alliance, labelled Mr Howard and Attorney-General Philip Ruddock "war criminals'' and said Mr Bush's decision would not help solve the problems in Iraq. "We know it is not going to solve anything at all,'' she said. "We know it will result in the death of thousands more Iraqis.
Source: News.com.au
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