(MintPress)-The European Court of Human Rights ruled on Tuesday that Britain can extradite five terror suspects to the United States without violating European human rights code. After nearly a decade in UK prisons, Abu Hamza, a radical preacher, and Babar Ahmad, an alleged terrorist fund-raiser, will now prepare to be extradited to the US along with Seyla Talha Ahsan, Adel Abdul Bary and Khaled Al-Fawwaz, where suspects will face life sentences in maximum-security prison.
The five accused men argued in Court that extradition to the US violated their Article 3 rights, which prohibit inhuman or degrading treatment, because of the torture-like treatment and inhuman conditions they would face in the United States Penitentiary, Administrative Maximum Facility (ADX) in Florence, Colorado, which will likely house the prisoners among other convicted terrorists in the United States.
The Court rejected these claims, ruling unanimously that there would be “no violation of Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights as a result of conditions of detention at ADX Florence.” The applicants’ complaints also related to “the alleged lack of procedural safeguards before placement at ADX and…at ADX’s restrictive conditions and lack of human contact.”
The Court responded, saying, “…the Federal Bureau of Prisons applies accessible and rational criteria when deciding whether to transfer an inmate to ADX…Even if the transfer process were unsatisfactory, there would be recourse to both the Bureau’s administrative remedy programme and the federal courts, by bringing a claim under the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, to cure any defects in the proces.”
Controversy over US-UK 2003 Extradition Law
While the Court’s decision highlights Europe’s view on tough US prisons, it fails to address controversial questions about the UK’s Extradition Act of 2003, including clauses that allow the US to extradite UK citizens for offenses committed against US law, even though the alleged offense may have been committed in the UK.
Babar Ahmad, a UK citizen, is being extradited based on allegations of providing material support to terrorists including Chechen and Taliban fighters, money laundering, and conspiring to kill people through the operation of Azzam.com, previously a vastly popular terrorist propaganda site.
The US charges against Ahmad are also punishable under UK law, where the alleged offenses took place, yet Ahmad has never been charged in the UK or been presented with evidence against him. Ahmad, arrested in 2004, has been detained-without-charge longer than anyone in Britain held in connection with the global ‘war on terror.’
For the past eight years, Ahmad and his family have fought for a UK trial instead of extradition. “Babar is a British citizen accused of a crime said to have been committed in the UK, and all the evidence against him was gathered in this country,” said Babar’s father, Ashfaq Ahmad. “Nevertheless, British justice appears to have been subcontracted to the US,” he said.
Several attempts were made to charge Ahmad in the UK justice system. However, each time, it was ruled that there was “insufficient evidence” to charge Babar Ahmad with any criminal offense under UK law. Thankfully for the US, the UK Extradition Act only requires proof of reasonable suspicion in order for a person to be extradited.
Ahmad admits to fighting in the Chechen war, but denies any support for terrorism. In an exclusive interview with the BBC, Ahmad said, “I absolutely reject any allegation that I supported terrorism in any way…I believe terrorism to be wrong and I believe the targeting and killing of innocent people to be wrong.”
In the interview, Ahmad said that he believes his case was mishandled and evidence was outsourced directly to the US. “’I have never been questioned about allegations against me and I have never been shown any evidence against me,” said Ahmad.
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) confirmed to the BBC that only a small portion of the evidence collected was presented to police in the UK and that evidence was insufficient for a prosecution.
According to the CPS, “At the time this decision was made, domestic prosecutors were aware of the nature of the evidence in the possession of the US, but the entirety of the evidence was never subject to review in this country as it formed part of the case built by the US and was held there.”
ADX Florence Supermax Prison Not Cruel Punishment?
Ahmad’s family plans to appeal Tuesday’s decision to the European Court’s grand chamber while continuing to push for a UK trial. Although there are three months before this week’s decision is made final, it is likely that all five terror suspects will be relocated to the US where the defendants face life in solitary confinement in one of the toughest prisons in the country.
ADX, unofficially known as the Alcatraz of the Rockies, was built in 1994 to house prisoners who are deemed the most dangerous of all in the United States federal prison system. Located in Florence, Colorado, ADX has received harsh criticism for its use of solitary confinement.
Prisoners at ADX are confined to single cells, sometimes as small as 75.5 square feet, with concrete furniture for 22-23 hours a day. With little sunlight and no human contact, inmates are known to have developed psychological illnesses.
Thomas Silverstein, convicted of armed robbery and four murders while imprisoned, has been held in solitary confinement in ADX for 28 years, longer than any other prisoner in the US Bureau of Prisons. “The cell was so small that I could stand in one place and touch both walls simultaneously,” said Silverstein. “I was permitted to wear underwear, but I was given no other clothing.”
Silverstein said he was isolated and also disoriented by the artificial, buzzing lights, his inability to have a clock, and lack of reading or recreation materials. “In the side pocket cell, I lost my ability to distinguish what was real,” said Silverstein.
In 1993, Psychiatrist Dr. Stuart Grassian found that solitary confinement induces psychiatric disorders among inmates characterized by hypersensitivity to external stimuli, hallucinations, panic attacks, cognitive deficits, obsessive thinking, paranoia, and more. Dr. Grassian observed high rates of anxiety, anger, violent fantasies, perspiring hands, and heart palpitations among the inmates he assessed at Pelican Bay State Prison in California.
Despite several previous and ongoing lawsuits claiming that solitary confinement is a form of psychological torture, the European Court on Court of Human Rights ruled that a life sentence at ADX would not constitute inhuman and degrading treatment given the crimes that the five UK terror suspects are accused of committing.
The Court ruled that there was nothing to suggest that if convicted in the US, the five suspects would not continually undergo security risk assessments and that inmates would surely be provided with in-cell stimulation “through television and radio channels, frequent newspapers, books, hobby and craft items and educational programming.”
The Court added that, “The range of activities and services provided goes beyond what is provided in many prisons in Europe…the services provided by ADX are supplemented by regular telephone calls and social visits and by the ability of inmates, even those under special administrative measures, to correspond with their families.”
However, Dr Sharon Shalev, a criminologist at the London School of Economics, who has visited American high-security facilities, told the BBC, “Supermax prisons are very extreme. I have a feeling the courts don’t realise how extreme they are. I’ve yet to see a European prison as extreme.”
The five suspects will not be extradited until Tuesday’s judgement becomes final or until an appeals process ends. The Court is waiting to release a ruling regarding a sixth suspect, Haroon Rashid Aswat, until more information is known about his schizophrenia and the conditions of his detention at a British hospital.