Execution by Neglect

February 7, 2008 in Political Animals | No comments

This is what blind abject terror does to a society: The United States imprisoned a man on charges made by unnamed accusers, failed to allow a single witness to speak in his defense, and simply held him in jail until he died.

Abdul Razzaq Hekmati was regarded here as a war hero, famous for his resistance to the Russian occupation in the 1980s and later for a daring prison break he organized for three opponents of the Taliban government in 1999.

But in 2003, Mr. Hekmati was arrested by American forces in southern Afghanistan when, senior Afghan officials here contend, he was falsely accused by his enemies of being a Taliban commander himself. For the next five years he was held at the American military base in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, where he died of cancer on Dec. 30.

The Bush administration has abandoned the concept of justice. Guantanamo is a national disgrace, and cannot be shut down a moment too soon.