Court rules for Guantanamo inmate
Huzaifa Parhat, a Uighur Muslim, must be released, transferred or given a new hearing, a federal appeals court rules. It's another setback for the Bush administration.
WASHINGTON — A federal appeals court said Monday that the U.S. military improperly labeled a Chinese Muslim held at Guantanamo Bay an "enemy combatant" and it ordered that he be released, transferred or granted a new hearing.
The ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington marks the first time a federal court has weighed in on the issue of a Guantanamo detainee's classification and granted him the opportunity to try to secure his release through civilian courts.
A lawyer for Huzaifa Parhat, who has been kept virtually incommunicado for more than six years, said he and other members of Parhat's legal team would seek to have him freed immediately. Parhat is one of 17 Uighur Muslims, an ethnic minority in China, who are still being held at Guantanamo even though the U.S. government acknowledges they pose no threat.
"It is a tremendous day. It is a very conservative court, but we pressed ahead and we won unanimously," said lawyer P. Sabin Willett. "But Huzaifa Parhat is now in his seventh year of imprisonment at Guantanamo Bay, and he doesn't even know about this ruling because he's sitting in solitary confinement and we can't tell him about it. That's what we do to people in this country -- we put them in solitary confinement even when they are not enemy combatants."
A Pentagon spokesman, Navy Cmdr. Jeffrey Gordon, declined to discuss the ruling and referred calls to the Justice Department, which issued a statement saying, "We're reviewing the decision and considering our options."
The decision was the latest in a series of legal setbacks for the Bush administration and its efforts to defend the military commissions process at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
The order came just 11 days after the Supreme Court ruled that the 270 or so detainees at Guantanamo have a constitutional right of habeas corpus, which allows them to challenge their detention in federal courts. That ruling marked the third time since 2004 that the nation's highest court has limited the government's power to use the military to detain and prosecute foreign nationals at Guantanamo.
The appeals court specified that Parhat could "seek release immediately" through a writ of habeas corpus in light of the Supreme Court's June 12 decision.
Parhat's case and scores like it had been put on hold until the Supreme Court made its ruling on the habeas corpus issue.
- Federal judge orders release of five Guantanamo prisoners Nov 21, 2008
- Dilemma in Guantanamo's waning days Jan 12, 2009
- The shadow of Gitmo Oct 12, 2008
