Friday, September 02, 2005



Changing the colour of the kangaroo

The US is reforming the kangaroo courts it uses at Guantanamo, allowing defendants to hear more of the evidence against them and having the presiding officer fill a role closer to that of a judge in an ordinary courtroom. However, the military commissions will still fail to meet basic standards of justice: defendants will still be tried on secret evidence, be judged by a jury whose impartiality and independence fail to pass the laugh test, and have no effective right of appeal. The kangaroo court will remain a kangaroo court; all the US is doing here is changing the colour of the kangaroo...

0 comments: