Leading Jurists to Talk About Guantanamo, Secret Jails, Military
Commissions and the War on Terror
NEW YORK, September 12 /PRNewswire/ —
WHO
The Eminent Jurists Panel on Terrorism, Counter-terrorism and Human
Rights, an independent body of the Geneva-based International Commission of Jurists, will be talking to the press after concluding a three-day public hearing in Washington on terrorist threats and the U.S. response to these threats since 9/11.
The jurists will share their preliminary findings after hearing
testimony from relatives of 9/11 victims, leading US lawyers, counter
terrorism experts and national and international human rights experts. They also met with senior government officials and will talk about Guantanamo detainees, secret jails, trials by military commissions, treatment of “terror” detainees, and the current U.S. debate over whether international
standards need to be revised.
WHAT
Composed of eight judges, lawyers and academics from all regions of the
world, the panel has been conducting a global inquiry on how states could
protect themselves from terrorism without affecting human rights and the
rule of law. Six similar hearings have been conducted in Australia,
Colombia, East Africa, Morocco and the United Kingdom. A global report on
those meetings and final statements will be issued in 2007.
WHEN
New York Press Briefing: Thursday, September 14, 2006, 10:30 a.m. to
11:30 a.m.
WHERE
Rumford Hall (in the lobby)
The Midtown Executive Club, Chemists Club
& The Terrace Club at Rockefeller Plaza
40 West 45th Street (The Overseas Press Club)
New York, NY 10036
BACKGROUND
Present at the New York press meeting: Panel Chairman Arthur
Chaskalson, a former Chief Justice and first President of the
Constitutional Court of South Africa, Mary Robinson, former UN High
Commissioner for Human Rights and former President of Ireland. Georges
Abi-Saab(Egypt), former Judge at the International Criminal Tribunals for
the former Yugoslavia and for Rwanda; Robert K.Goldman (United States),
Professor of Law at American University’s Washington College of Law, a
former President of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and
former UN expert on counter-terrorism and human rights, Hina Jilani
(Pakistan), a human rights advocate from Pakistan and the UN Secretary
General’s Special Representative on Human Rights Defenders.
CONTACT: Ana Arana, Media Consultant, +1-347-255-8691
anarana@attglobal.net
Isabelle Heyer +41-22-9793800 Heyer@icj.org The ICJ website is
