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“Just one week after the election and the Obama camp is sounding like the Bush administration on Guantanamo Bay,”according to Mary Ellen O’Connell, Robert and Marion Short Professor of Law in the Notre Dame Law School.
“They are talking of a new ‘Security Court’ or the need to study the situation before taking action,”O’Connell said.“Obama’s advisers need to study their Geneva Conventionsthose solemn, binding treaties forbid cooking up new courts to try people after they have been detained.”
According to O’Connell,"The conventions also make clear we may only detain people without charge detained in a real armed conflict, not the concocted ‘global war on terror.’ They also make clear we cannot detain children.
“The president-elect promised change and that should be change from violating international law. His advisers need to give him accurate advice, which is to close Guantanamo now and get into compliance with the law of armed conflict.”
O’Connell, author of"The Power and Purpose of International Law,"has written and lectured on international legal regulation of the use of force and conflict and dispute resolution, especially peaceful resolution of disputes prior to an escalation to armed conflict. She also has been active in the American Society of International Law, the International Institute for Humanitarian Law, the International Law Association, and the Council on Foreign Relations.
_ Contact: Mary Ellen O’Connell, 574-631-7953,_ " MaryEllenOConnell@nd.edu ":mailto:MaryEllenOConnell@nd.edu
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