Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams said in comments broadcast on Sunday that he feared the US prison camp at Guantanamo Bay has set a dangerous precedent for international law.
The senior clergyman of the Church of England said he believed the remote base in eastern Cuba was an "extraordinary legal anomaly," echoing comments of British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who has also termed the base an "anomaly."
Williams said the camp sets a dangerous precedent.
"Any message given that any state can just override some of the basic habeas corpus type provisions, is going to be very welcome to tyrants elsewhere in the world, now and in the future," Williams told the BBC in an interview broadcast on Sunday.
"What, in 10 years' time, are people going to be able to say about a system that tolerates this?" Williams asked.
Nine British citizens detained at Guantanamo were released in 2004 and last year.
Only a handful have been charged since the camp opened in January 2002.
Williams also said he believed some Muslims had shown a "hysterical overreaction" to the publication of cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed.
He said, however, that he understood the sense of anger felt by many Muslims who believe their faith is "pushed to the edge of every discussion." But he added that acts of terrorism were "an insult to God and man."
Williams, who was speaking during a visit to Khartoum, in Sudan, on Tuesday, touched upon other contentious areas of free speech during the interview.
He said comments made by British historian David Irving, who was jailed for three years in Austria for denying the Holocaust, did amount to a hate crime.
Williams, who has been warmly praised for his openness since becoming archbishop in July 2002, also acknowledged that divisions in the Anglican church over the appointment of gay bishops and gay priests could take years to reconcile.
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