Guantanamo's fate awaits election result

[struggle4progress]

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
November 2, 2008

... A hundred canvas tents pitched on a weed-choked airfield to house an army of lawyers and journalists stand mostly empty, even as air conditioning blasts through them to keep iguanas and large rodents at bay ...

Barack Obama and John McCain have both pledged, if elected, to close the offshore prison at Guantanamo Bay. Amnesty International Secretary-general Irene Khan this week urged whoever wins to make good on that promise in his first 100 days in office.

The current trial, which charges Ali Hamza al-Bahlul with being bin Laden's media specialist, is only the second held since then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld outlined the initial rules in March 2002.

Only one more is scheduled before Bush's term ends on Jan. 20: a relatively minor case that charges an Afghan with wounding two U.S. soldiers and their interpreter when he was 16 or 17 in 2002. A judge threw out his confession this week because it was obtained through torture ...

http://www.newsday.com/news/printedition/nation/ny-usguan025908802nov02,0,6671032.story