Center for Constitutional Rights

When President Obama declared early in his presidency that he plans to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay, that was hardly the end of the matter. Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder must now figure out what to do with the 240 or so people still held there. And perhaps no cases cry out more [...]

It was an odd but refreshing spectacle, to see U.S.-based human rights lawyers arguing to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights that the United States has effectively insulated itself from accountability for torture and war crimes, and ought to be pushed by an international body to do better.

Human Rights USA, the Center for Constitutional Rights and the American Civil Liberties Union are expected to make their case why the United States must prosecute former Bush administration officials for war crimes and grave violations of international law before the Inter-American Commission for Human Rights this afternoon in Washington.
At a special hearing, leaders of [...]

In a rare victory for torture victims, a federal judge yesterday ruled that detainees who claim they were tortured at the notorious Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq can move ahead with their lawsuit against defense contractor CACI, which t the U.S. government hired to assist in interrogations of Iraqi prisoners.
CNN reports that U.S. District Court [...]

I could not be more confused now. Yesterday President-elect Barack Obama says it’s “more difficult than I think a lot of people realize” to close Guantanamo Bay. Today the Center for Constitutional Rights gently refutes him. And now — and I’m not saying the two things are necessarily related — Lara Jakes Jordan of the [...]

As promised, here’s the Center for Constitutional Rights’ three-phase plan to close Guantanamo Bay.

President-elect Barack Obama seems to think it’s kind of hard to close Guantanamo Bay:
It is more difficult than I think a lot of people realize and we are going to get it done but part of the challenge that you have is that you have a bunch of folks that have been detained, many of [...]

The New York Times’ opinion page has long been a strong supporter of the rights of detainees at Guantanamo Bay, but the Times moved a step further today, to support detainees’ right to sue for monetary damages.

SCOTUSblog reports that the federal district court judge in Washington overseeing 113 habeas cases involving about 200 Guantanamo detainees caved to the government’s demands yesterday, significantly modifying his previous order requiring broad disclosure by the government to the detainees and their lawyers about the government’s legal and factual justification for holding the prisoners.

Lawyers for Maher Arar, a 34-year-old Syrian-born Canadian who was arrested at JFK airport, taken to Syria, interrogated and tortured, argue he has a right to sue for damages. If the Second Circuit sides with Arar, the government could face many more lawsuits.