U.S. Prison in Guantanamo Naval Base Turns Ten

Washington, Jan 11. -After a decade, the U.S. prison in the illegal naval base in Guantanamo, Cuba, is still a center where prisoners have been tortured and many of them are still subject to indefinite detentions.President Barrack Obama has not kept his electoral promise, made three years ago, to close the prison center, an announcement that then earned him the support of voters and the international community in light of continuous allegations of abuses against prisoners.

Obama´s willingness seems to have fallen into a bottomless pit, because, on December 31, 2011, he signed the 2012 National Authorization Act, an initiative that prevents the closure of the detention camp and prohibits the transfer of inmates to prisons in the United States.

The approval of unlimited detentions kills that promise, as 171 Muslim inmates fit to be released are still held indefinitely in that place, said Brian Terrel, a human rights activist in Maloy, Iowa.

Obama´s action is a stain in his legacy, because he will always be known as the president who signed the definite detention of people without charges or a trial, stated Anthony Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).

In January 2002, the administration of President George W. Bush began sending suspected terrorists belonging to Al Qaeda, Taliban insurgents and others to the Guantanamo detention camp.

The first plane carrying 20 prisoners arrived in the Guantanamo Bay ten years ago, a time when this new architecture of torture, abuse and indefinite detention started, recalled Beth Brockman, a human rights activist and mother of two in Durham, North Carolina.

We have called January 11 the National Day of Shame, she noted.

For days, human rights organizations have staged protests in front of the White House against the prison center in Guantanamo against the will of Cuban authorities and people.

It is considered the most expensive prison center in the world, because it costs 800,000 dollars per inmate a year to U.S. taxpayers, 30 times the cost of maintaining a convict in federal prisons, The Bellingham Herald newspaper reported in November. (Prensa Latina)