Guantanamo is overdue for closure

Washington, D.C., January 11^th, 2023.  Twenty-one years have passed since the opening of the Guantánamo detention center and the Biden administration continues to fail to close it, in violation of its international human rights obligations. Thirty-five men remain in the prison; most of them have never been charged or tried for any crime, and none of them have had access to a fair trial that meets international standards.

On October 28, 2022, the organizations Center for Justice and International Law (CEJIL) and the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) addressed the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), at a public hearing on the status of the precautionary measures granted in favor of the detainees at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base. During the hearing, we emphasized that the failure of the United States to comply with these precautionary measures is unacceptable. Although the government has made efforts, the pace of the transfers is too slow and at this rate, the closure of the prison will not be achieved before the end of President Biden’s current term.

In October 2022, one day after the public hearing at the IACHR, Mr. Saif Ullah Paracha, a Pakistani national, was released and transferred to his home country after 20 years of arbitrary detention at Guantánamo, one of just five men transferred in the last two years. While we welcome each transfer from the prison, we urge the administration to increase the pace of transfers: twenty-one years after the prison opened, ten years after the IACHR ordered its immediate closure, and more than two years after the conclusion of the conflict in Afghanistan, a concrete plan and timetable for closure is urgently needed.

As representatives of the precautionary measures for men detained at Guantánamo, CEJIL urges the U.S. government to guarantee due process, end the use of military commissions, and close the Guantánamo detention center. We also urge the IACHR to facilitate dialogue with OAS member states that are willing and able to accept detainees who need to be resettled in a third country, as the transfer of prisoners is a necessary condition for the urgent closure of the prison.