Judge allows forced feeding to resume on Guantanamo detainee
May 23, 2014
A federal judge has lifted a temporary ban on painful forced feedings of a Guantanamo Bay detainee, saying she had no choice and "the court simply cannot let (him) die."
In the meantime, the
court will advance a "speedy exchange" of information about terrorism
detainee Mohammed Abu Wa'el Dhiab's request to stop what he describes as
abusive forced feedings, U.S. District Court Judge Gladys Kessler ruled
late Thursday.
Dhiab, 42, a Syrian, was
arrested in Pakistan in 2002 and has been detained in the U.S.
military's facility for terrorism suspects at Guantanamo for more than
10 years, according to the London-based human rights group Reprieve.
Dhiab has stopped eating,
and his case is example of the forced feedings at Guantanamo, which the
U.S. government has been administering typically to detainees who go on
hunger strikes. Dhiab was cleared for release by the Obama
administration in 2009 and has never been charged, Reprieve's website
said.
Kessler said the court
"is now faced with an anguishing Hobson's choice: reissue another
temporary restraining order despite the very real probability that Mr.
Dhiab will die, because he has indicated a continuing desire to refuse
to eat and/or drink liquids, or refuse to issue the TRO and allow the
medical personnel on the scene to take the medical actions to keep Mr.
Dhiab alive, but at the possible cost of great pain and suffering."
"The Court is in no
position to make the complex medical decisions necessary to keep Mr.
Dhiab alive," the judge said. "Thanks to the intransigence of the
Department of Defense, Mr. Dhiab may well suffer unnecessary pain from
certain enteral feeding practices and forcible cell extractions.
However, the Court simply cannot let Mr. Dhiab die."
The judge noted that Mr.
Dhiab's physical condition has been "swiftly deteriorating, in large
part because he was refusing food and/or water."
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