Welcome

Berkeley (CA) City Council passes a resolution supporting Guantanamo closure, justice for detainees

Read the October 25, 2011, resolution here [1]; news release here [2]. Berkeley is now the third municipality, and the first city, to welcome cleared detainees who cannot safely return to their home countries.

The situation

The Bush administration created the Guantánamo Bay prison in Cuba, a prison at Bagram air base in Afghanistan, and other offshore prisons as "law-free zones" that it believed were exempt from U.S. and international law, including the Geneva Conventions and the nearly 800-year-old writ of habeas corpus. The U.S. Supreme Court disagrees.

President Obama promised to close Guantánamo Bay prison, and his administration cleared more than 100 of the remaining prisoners for release, but Congress has halted transfers to a standstill. Other men there, at Bagram, and at other offshore prisons may also be wrongly held by the U.S. military. Some of these men cannot safely return to their home countries. Unfortunately, nine years of scare-mongering have taken a toll on Americans' commitment to human rights for detainees.

Be part of the solution

Join No More Guantánamos [3] in a grassroots initiative of concerned citizens, communities, organizations, and pro-bono attorneys representing detainees to:

Engage the public in a fact-based dialogue about the planned closure of Guantánamo Bay prison and U.S. detainee policy
Transform prisoners’ images in the U.S. from faceless, nameless “terrorists” to human beings who deserve human rights and a presumption of innocence until proven guilty
Use prisoners’ stories to overcome unfounded fears of prisoners in your community

New!

New videos include a March 30 conversation on U.S. detention policies [4] featuring Pardiss Kebriaei of the Center for Constitutional Rights and Michael Sullivan of Ashcroft Sullivan, and weekly vigils [5] of the Des Moines Anti-Torture Collective.
Show the remaining prisoners that the world has not forgotten them. Write a letter or send a card today. [6]

Updated toolkit [7] to support grassroots public education about the planned closure of Guantánamo Bay prison, using prisoners' stories to overcome musunderstandings about the prisoners.
Bagram Prison [8] annotated list of prisoners compiled by Andy Worthington [9].

Newest resolution

On October 25, 2011, the Berkeley city council approved a resolution to welcome a few cleared detainees.

Read the resolution here [1].
Read news release here [10].
Watch a 20-minute video of a public forum supporting the resolution here [11].

Five of the 171 detainees who remain at Guantánamo Bay prison

The prison at Bagram air force base in Afghanistan currently holds more than 1,500 detainees.

[12] [13]

Links:
[1] http://www.nogitmos.org/berkeleytresolutionclosingguantanamo
[2] http://www.nogitmos.org/berkeleycitycounciladoptsresolutionsupportingguant%C3%A1namoprisonclosureandjusticedetainee
[3] http://www.nogitmos.org/getinvolved
[4] http://www.nogitmos.org/usdetentionpoliciesdecadeafter911twoperspectivessecurity0
[5] http://www.nogitmos.org/videosdesmoines
[6] http://www.nogitmos.org/writeremainingguantanamobayprisoners
[7] http://www.nogitmos.org/toolkithumanrightschampioncity
[8] http://www.nogitmos.org/bagramprisonerlist
[9] http://www.andyworthington.co.uk/
[10] http://www.nogitmos.org/berkeleycitycounciladoptsresolutionsupportingguant%2526aacute%3Bnamoprisonclosureandjusticedetainee
[11] http://www.nogitmos.org/leverettresolutionsolvingguantanamoquagmire
[12] http://www.facebook.com/pages/No-More-Guantanamos/142502677202
[13] http://www.twitter.com/nogitmos