The United States: a Country Beyond the Law

America's Foul Treatment of Prisoners 'Impossible to Deny'

From El Universal (Mexico), an OpEd piece by Victor Flores Olea, which situates the US in the context of global perceptions of human rights and the rule of law.

We don't fare too well in others' eyes...

Hypocrisy, an overarching war mentality, and a disregard for the basic principles of human rights and international legal obligations continue to mark the U.S.’s “war on terror.”

...The detention camp at Guantánamo has become a symbol of the Bush Administration’s refusal to put human rights and the rule of law at the heart of its response to the atrocities of September 11.

...Amnesty (says) “It is nearly a year since the United States Supreme Court ruled that U.S. courts have the jurisdiction to consider appeals from detainees in Guantánamo Bay.” It is evident that the Bush Administration has sought to block judicial review every step of the way, and to remain as far above the judicial process as possible.

The most serious of the Bush administration’s anti-judicial actions does violence to one of the cardinal principles of the U.S. Constitution, which calls for checks and balances between the three branches of government. “It seems rather contrary to an idea of a Constitution with three branches that the executive would be free to do whatever they want, whatever they want without a check.” (U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, 20 April 2004).

...Donald Rumsfeld, the Secretary of Defense, personally authorized those and other techniques of torture to interrogate the prisoners in Guantánamo (Amnesty International report).

...To this, it is necessary to add the legal maneuverings the U.S. government is currently undertaking to avoid extraditing Luis Posada Carriles to Venezuela, where he escaped from jail in 1976 after being charged in connection with the bombing of a Cuban airliner which killed 73 people.

And, to make matters worse, and in confirmation of the scorn of the Bush Administration shows toward the norms of international law and multilateral organizations, the U.S. is only sending a third-ranking diplomat to attend next year’s festivities in San Francisco celebrating the United Nations’ 60th anniversary. Of course, George W. Bush and Condoleezza Rice had been invited to the ceremony. For the United States, any sign of resistance or limitation to its imperial and unilateral power is intolerable. For that reason, more than ever, it is worth reiterating the question: is this definitively a country without laws?