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Annan wants Guantanamo closed

Pressure on the US over its military prison at Guantanamo Bay mounted on Thursday as UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan called for closure "as soon as possible."

Annan's words reinforced the findings released earlier on Thursday of a panel of five UN human rights investigators, who condemned the facility as a place of torture and rights abuses that should be closed.

"I cannot agree with everything in the report, but the basic point is that one cannot detain individuals in perpetuity," Annan told reporters.

"Sooner or later there will be a need to close Guantanamo. It will be up to the government to decide. Hopefully, it will be done as soon as possible."

The US has detained at least 520 suspects since 2002 at Guantanamo without bringing charges or holding trials. Military tribunals were started in October. The practise has been assailed by US and international human rights groups.

In the 54-page report, the five investigators called for Guantanamo to be closed "without further delay" and the transfer of the detainees to "pretrial detention facilities on United States territory."

Until then, the US government should revoke "all special interrogation techniques authorized by the Department of Defense" and refrain from practices of "torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment," they wrote.

Washington says that the report is flawed because the investigators refused to visit the facility.

The report is a "discredit to the UN when a team like this goes about rushing to report something when they haven't even looked into the facts," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said. "All they have done is look at the allegations."

The UN rapporteurs were given permission to visit Guantanamo, but not to interview detainees.

The UN team refused to go because it would have contravened the UN's principles of human rights investigations.
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