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Politics : Moderate Forum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Brumar89 who wrote (6688)	2/9/2004 8:27:29 AM
From: zonder	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 20773

We already had American soldiers captured during the recent war. Though I think some were mistreated, they generally did have POW status as they should have. I don't think you understood what I was referring to. I was not talking about Miss Lynch recovering in a hospital. This is what I was talking about: hrw.org Guantanamo detainees are not soldiers of another state at war with us. They don't have to be. --------------------------------------------------------- Geneva Convention re Treatment of POWs: Article 4 A. Prisoners of war, in the sense of the present Convention, are persons belonging to ONE of the following categories, who have fallen into the power of the enemy: 1. Members of the armed forces of a Party to the conflict as well as members of militias or volunteer corps forming part of such armed forces. 2. Members of other militias and members of other volunteer corps, including those of organized resistance movements, belonging to a Party to the conflict and operating in or outside their own territory, even if this territory is occupied, provided that such militias or volunteer corps, including such organized resistance movements, fulfil the following conditions: (a) That of being commanded by a person responsible for his subordinates; (b) That of having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance; (c) That of carrying arms openly; (d) That of conducting their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war. 6. Inhabitants of a non-occupied territory, who on the approach of the enemy spontaneously take up arms to resist the invading forces, without having had time to form themselves into regular armed units, provided they carry arms openly and respect the laws and customs of war. unhchr.ch The slight problem for you, Bush, and anyone else who tries to argue Geneva Convention does not apply to the people they have been holding incommunicado for more than two years in Guantanamo is that the Geneva convention is expressly designed to prevent the winning side from declaring the other's combatants outside the scope of the convention. As you can see above, prisoners don't have to be part of a military, with uniforms and such, to qualify as POWs. Note the wording - They only have to belong to ONE of the categories, NOT ALL. Hence, military with insignia etc are POWs. So are the peasants who took their rifle in hand and fired a shot at the invading US soldiers in their pijamas. The wording is very clear. If you wish to counter what I have said, find a passage in the Geneva Convention re POWs that says prisoners have to be "soldiers of another state at war with us" etc. There is another Article of the Convention you might like to be familiar with: ------------------------------------------------------- Article 5 The present Convention shall apply to the persons referred to in Article 4 from the time they fall into the power of the enemy and until their final release and repatriation. Should any doubt arise as to whether persons, having committed a belligerent act and having fallen into the hands of the enemy, belong to any of the categories enumerated in Article 4, such persons shall enjoy the protection of the present Convention until such time as their status has been determined by a competent tribunal. ----------------------------------------------------- .... which means you CANNOT lock people up for two years and say "they're not POWs because I say so". Which is exactly what the US has done so far. We did, however, treat captured Iraqi soldiers in the recent war as POW's and that was correct. What, exactly, in your opinion, is the difference between the Iraqis captured during the invasion of Iraq who fought US forces and the Afghans captured during the invasion of Afghanistan who fought US forces that one merited POW status and the other didn't? Careful... Trick question :-)