An interview with Andy Worthington, author of 'The Guantánamo File' (Elizabeth Ferrari)

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Andy Worthington


"There really are no half-measures. With Obama’s promise, America has emerged from an extraordinarily bleak period in which the fear of terror -- however legitimate -- combined with the leadership of men devoted to something that closely resembled dictatorial power, sullied America’s reputation, and laid waste to the principles on which the country was founded. There is a better way, and it involves dialog, and not the “dark side” -- dialog with one’s enemies, and dialog with those who have been captured. Only a stupid man believes that you can beat the truth out of a prisoner."

Elizabeth Ferrari -- World News Trust

March 22, 2009 -- Andy Worthington, a London-based journalist, is the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison, and has written over 300 articles about Guantánamo in the last two years, for publications including the New York Times, the Guardian, the Huffington Post and AlterNet.

Earlier this month, he published the first definitive list of all the prisoners who have been held at Guantánamo, with links and references to their stories. In a statement, he explained, “It is my hope that this project will provide an invaluable research tool for those seeking to understand how it came to pass that the government of the United States turned its back on domestic and international law, establishing torture as official U.S. policy, and holding men without charge or trial neither as prisoners of war, protected by the Geneva Conventions, nor as criminal suspects to be put forward for trial in a federal court, but as ‘illegal enemy combatants.’”

Elizabeth Ferrari: I have described the transfer of prisoners from Afghanistan to Guantánamo as a “rendition flight” -- one that anyone who knew what to look for could recognize. Is that right, in your opinion? My memory is that the conditions of the prisoners was broadcast all over the American media and that we were shown these people, shackled and hooded, led into the prison.

Andy Worthington: You’re correct to describe the transfer of prisoners from Afghanistan to Guantánamo as a “rendition flight” -- or, to be more accurate, many dozens of rendition flights. I generally describe it as rendition on an industrial scale. What’s interesting is that the US military was entitled to establish a prisoner of war camp outside Afghanistan, but, of course, Guantánamo was no such thing, and instead was -- and is -- an experiment in holding prisoners beyond the law, neither as prisoners of war nor as criminal suspects, who would be expected to face a trial in a federal court, but as “enemy combatants” without rights; essentially, subjects in an illegal and unconstitutional experiment in detention and interrogation.

Ferrari: Can you describe who these people are -- these prisoners that Donald Rumsfeld said were “the worst of the worst?” Who are they and how did they get to Gitmo?

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