by- Suzie-Q @ 8:21 PM MST
WASHINGTON — Hooded prisoners in steel cages. Abusive interrogations. Indefinite detention. These elements of the military prison at Guantanamo Bay have provoked global outrage — and may now be leading to its closure.
Perhaps no other place in U.S. history has inspired more condemnation and controversy than Guantanamo Bay, where prisoners suspected of links to al-Qaida and the Taliban face indefinite incarceration without trial and four have been driven to commit suicide.
The detention center opened on what was then a sleepy U.S. Navy base in southeast Cuba in January 2002, when bound and blindfolded prisoners were put into cages exposed to the merciless sun and rain. In the 5 1/2 years since then, the U.S. military prison has been transformed — most detainees are now held in concrete-and-steel cellblocks.
Now, senior Bush administration officials tell The Associated Press they are nearing a decision to close the offshore military prison — saying they are close to a consensus that this symbol of the U.S. global war on terror has become a burden.
If so, it’s a major reversal. U.S. officials have long insisted that Guantanamo is essential, that its critics are either wrong, misguided or worse.
More than 770 men have been held there. About half have been released or transferred to countries, which promptly freed most of them. About 375 prisoners remain, deprived of any real opportunity to challenge the accusations against them.
“Guantanamo was born purely out of fear and hysteria following Sept. 11 but over time more and more people have come to realize that we do not have to abandon our basic principles to protect ourselves,” said Tom Wilner, a Washington attorney who has represented detainees. “And I think the administration is coming to the same conclusion.”
