I was appalled to learn yesterday that among the 600-plus prisoners being held without charges and without legal rights at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba is a handful of 13- to 16-year-old boys, who, after more than a year in some cases, are finally being released. This is thanks, in part, to pressure from Colin Powell. I applaud Powell for pressuring Rummy to release these kids.
Beyond the fact that these kids doubtfully pose any threat to Americans or to the American way of life, they and the rest of the terrorist suspects being held are, as today’s SF Chronicle editorial muses, “imprisoned in a legal netherworld in which they have no right to due process, a trial or access to an attorney.”
