More than 1,000 journalists have visited Guantanamo Bay since the US military began locking up suspected al-Qaeda and Taliban militants there four years ago. But press access is severely restricted: Journalists can't talk to detainees, must be accompanied by a military escort and have their photos censored.
Now, the Pentagon has shut down access entirely -- at least for the time being -- expelling reporters this week and triggering an outcry from human rights groups, attorneys and media organizations even as the prison comes under renewed criticism for the suicides of three detainees last weekend.
"Now is the time when the media is most needed," said Clive Stafford Smith, an attorney who has filed legal challenges on behalf of about 40 detainees. "The fact that right now, the most important time in the history of Guantanamo, they are being banned is un-American."
Pentagon defense
Pentagon officials defend the temporary ban on media, saying guards and base officials are preoccupied with investigating the deaths and maintaining security as detainees become more defiant. A clash with guards in May left six detainees injured. Another 10 prisoners were on hunger strike on Thursday, including six being force-fed with nasal tubes.
US officials say the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, which sits on cactus-studded hills in southeastern Cuba overlooking the Caribbean and mangrove forests, has been unusually open to journalists -- despite news media complaints that access while on the prison is severely curtailed and requests for interviews often vanish in the military bureaucracy.
"It's the most transparent detention facility in the history of warfare," insisted Navy Lieutenant Commander Jeffrey Gordon, a Pentagon spokesman, echoing comments by US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
But the Pentagon rejected all requests by news organizations this week to cover the investigation and aftermath of the suicides, the first detainee deaths since the detention center opened.
About 10 news organizations were to cover a military tribunal this week for one of the 10 detainees charged with crimes, but the hearing was postponed and hours before they were to depart for Guantanamo the Pentagon canceled the authorizations that reporters need to visit.
Reporters cover the hearings from the courtroom -- where they are barred from speaking with participants, even during breaks. Or they can view the proceedings on a large-screen TV near a press center where military censors peer at their photographs and video and decide what is out of bounds.
Expulsions
On Wednesday, the Pentagon expelled two journalists -- from the Los Angeles Times and the Miami Herald -- who arrived at Guantanamo on a charter flight on Sunday and two others from the Charlotte Observer, who were at the base for coverage of a commander from North Carolina.
The Paris-based group Reporters Without Borders said on Thursday that the expulsions damage the credibility of the US government.
"We ... call on the US government to take the necessary steps to guarantee the media free access to the naval base at Guantanamo," the group said.
South Korea has adjusted its electronic arrival card system to no longer list Taiwan as a part of China, a move that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said would help facilitate exchanges between the two sides. South Korea previously listed “Taiwan” as “Taiwan (China)” in the drop-down menus of its online arrival card system, where people had to fill out where they came from and their next destination. The ministry had requested South Korea make a revision and said it would change South Korea’s name on Taiwan’s online immigration system from “Republic of Korea” to “Korea (South),” should the issue not be
Tainan, Taipei and New Taipei City recorded the highest fines nationwide for illegal accommodations in the first quarter of this year, with fines issued in the three cities each exceeding NT$7 million (US$220,639), Tourism Administration data showed. Among them, Taipei had the highest number of illegal short-term rental units, with 410. There were 3,280 legally registered hotels nationwide in the first quarter, down by 14 properties, or 0.43 percent, from a year earlier, likely indicating operators exiting the market, the agency said. However, the number of unregistered properties rose to 1,174, including 314 illegal hotels and 860 illegal short-term rental
Both sides of the Taiwan Strait share a political foundation based on the “1992 consensus” and opposition to Taiwanese independence, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) today said during her meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平). Both sides of the Strait should plan and build institutionalized and sustainable mechanisms for dialogue and cooperation based on that foundation to make peaceful development across the Strait irreversible, she said. Peace is a shared moral value across the Strait, and both sides should move beyond political confrontation to seek institutionalized solutions to prevent war, she said. Mutually beneficial cross-strait relations are what the
ECONOMIC COERCION: Such actions are often inconsistently applied, sometimes resumed, and sometimes just halted, the Presidential Office spokeswoman said The government backs healthy and orderly cross-strait exchanges, but such arrangements should not be made with political conditions attached and never be used as leverage for political maneuvering or partisan agendas, Presidential Office spokeswoman Karen Kuo (郭雅慧) said yesterday. Kuo made the remarks after China earlier in the day announced 10 new “incentive measures” for Taiwan, following a landmark meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) in Beijing on Friday. The measures, unveiled by China’s Xinhua news agency, include plans to resume individual travel by residents of Shanghai and China’s Fujian
RSS