We invite you to join the Chicago Coalition to Close Guantanamo for our weekly vigil on Friday at 4:30-5:30 pm at Dearborn and Jackson!

[Bob Palmer]

We invite you to join the Chicago Coalition to Close Guantánamo for our weekly vigil on Friday at 4:30-5:30 pm at Dearborn and Jackson!

We are looking for folks to 
- Wear an orange jumpsuit and black hood which represent the men detained indefinitely in Guantánamo Bay Prison

- Hand out fliers to people walking by
- Engage people in conversation about the prison, policies and solutions to close Guantánamo!

- Hold a sign with the people in orange jumpsuits
- Come down to say hi, take a picture, make a post on Facebook/Twitter, etc.

Here is the info we'll be handing out this week:

167 Days Since President Obama’s Promise to Close Guantánamo: Only 2 Men Released: November 8, 2013
 

• 164 men remain imprisoned.  155 of them haven’t been charged.

• 84 men have been cleared for release, most of whom have been imprisoned without charge for more than 11 years.

• 14 men have been on hunger strike for 275 days.

• 14 men are being force-fed in violation of Article 7 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, ratified by the U.S., which prohibits torture or cruel, inhumane, and degrading treatment.

 
Two fallacies about Guantánamo often repeated by the press:
 
1. President Obama is blocked by Congress from releasing or transferring many of the remaining 164 detainees from Guantánamo.
 
This is not so. Congress had passed legislation effectively blocking the president from transferring detainees to their home or other countries, but it then amended the law two years ago to allow the president to waive those restrictions. As Carl Levin, the Chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, pointed out, that amendment "provides a clear route for the transfer of detainees to third countries.” The president has simply not used it.
 
2. There are some four dozen men at Guantánamo deemed too dangerous to release but who are ineligible for trial because evidence against them is inadmissible.
 
That line has been repeated time and again by the press, and never examined. It is simply not true. The government's basis for detaining each of the men at Guantánamo is now publicly available on WikiLeaks....There are clearly some bad guys down there - generally acknowledged now as fewer than 20. These men can all be tried. The only thing preventing their conviction is the Military Commission System itself, which is totally untested and ineffective. They would all have been convicted long ago in our federal courts. An examination of the government's basis for detaining the other men at Guantánamo shows that the reason they can't be tried is not because the evidence against them is inadmissible, but simply because it is so flimsy and speculative that it would be laughed out of any federal court in the country.
 
Excerpted from Missing the Point at Guantánamo by Thomas B. Wilner, available at http://bit.ly/1c3lNuP

Find out more about efforts to end indefinite detention and torture by the U.S. Government at Guantánamo Bay.  

Please sign petitions addressed to President Obama at the websites marked with a **.
 
**CLOSE GUANTÁNAMO: A group of lawyers, journalists, retired military personnel and concerned individuals who believe that Guantánamo undermines America's values and harms its national security. http://www.closeguantanamo.org
 
WITNESS AGAINST TORTURE: Formed in 2005, when 25 Americans went to Guantánamo and attempted to visit the detention facility. Once we returned from that journey, we began to organize more broadly to shut down Guantánamo. http://witnesstorture.org
 
**WORLD CAN'T WAIT: A national movement formed to halt and reverse the terrible program of war, repression and theocracy that was initiated by the Bush regime and continued and even intensified under President Obama. http://www.worldcantwait.net
 
ANDY WORTHINGTON: Investigative journalist, author, filmmaker, photographer and Guantánamo expert. http://www.andyworthington.co.uk
 
MIAMI HERALD: http://www.miamiherald.com/guantanamo/
 
IL COALITION AGAINST TORTURE: https://twitter.com/Illinois_CAT
 
Track the days since Obama’s promise at http://gtmoclock.com.
 
Chicago Coalition to Shut Down Guantánamo: World Can’t Wait, Witness Against Torture, White Rose Catholic Worker, Illinois Coalition Against Torture, Chicago Committee to Free the Cuban Five: www.facebook.com/ChicagoCoalitionToShutDownGuantanamo

Thank you for your support!