Posted on: Saturday, June 4, 2005

EDITORIAL
Guantánamo no 'gulag' but it is still not right

It's unfortunate Amnesty International chose the term "gulag of our times" to describe the American detention facility at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba.

Not only is this hyperbole, even its worst critics will acknowledge that the Guantánamo facility is a far cry from the brutal detention and labor camps organized by the former Soviet Union. It was also a mistake. It gave the Bush administration an easy way to respond to the otherwise legitimate criticism of the Guantánamo detentions found in the Amnesty report.

Rather than addressing the substance of the report — that the detainees in Cuba are being held in "arbitrary and indefinite detention in violation of international law" — the administration was able to focus on the word "gulag."

Wrong focus.

A far better response would be to either legitimately defend or explain what we are doing in Guantánamo and elsewhere.

There's little doubt that overall our handling of the Guantánamo detention center is far more humane, focused and disciplined than most. But that does not make it right.

"When the most powerful country in the world thumbs its nose at the rule of law and human rights, it grants a license to others to commit abuse with impunity and audacity," Amnesty wrote in a foreword to the report.

That's a strong point. If our handling of the detainees in Guantánamo is as defensible as we assert, then we should let groups such as Amnesty and others in to see for themselves.