Read other letters about this article

• Sunday, August 31, 2008 10:57 AM

  Musings about adnoto

  Gee, it's amazing that the very crowd that would "never" assume that someone was guilty just because they plead the Fifth, assumes that adnoto is a hypocrite because he can't be in Denver and Minneapolis. For the record, things are quite turned around, with the usually not into protest Glenn Greenwald doing a first hand on police raids on "radicals" and adnoto reduced to watching from afar.

  So now I, the anti-International A.N.S.W.E.R. guy who hates it when people hijack demonstrations will do my "Free Mummia" bit.

  If people are in New York City, or thereabouts, on Wednesday September 3rd, there is a bail hearing for Aafia Siddiqui at the U.S. District Court at 500 Pearl St. in Manhattan. There is a very real need for American interest and support on this case to ensure a fair trial. The case has not aroused great public interest in the U.S. and much of the press reporting has been of her as an al Qaeda mastermind, so maybe that's why. People like the ACLU and other U.S. civil libertarians seem strangely silent. Perhaps abused accused terrorists are like Descartes -- more convenient as heroes once they are dead.

  At any rate, there are more than enough violations of more than enough international laws* in her treatment just since July 17th to justify some attention, and if, as her lawyers contend, her health is indeed failing, time is a bit of the essence. Internationally, the protesters and the Pakistani government got less done in three weeks of street protests and official ambassadorial protests to the U.S. government than when one American human rights organization, Human Rights Watch, got involved with a very public plea to the Afghan government to release her son, who is due now to be released soon. So American protest over American treatment is very, very powerful.

  Oh, LondonLad, there's a protest Friday September 12 6-8pm, outside the U.S. Embassy, Grosvenor Square. Don't have any idea where that is, but I'm sure you do.

  *Fourth Geneva Convention, International Convention on the Rights of the Child, Convention Against Torture, International Convention on Civil and Political Rights, Vienna Convention... yeah, I know, nothing Constitutional except for that icky Law of Nations thingy.

  —ondelette Read ondelette's other letters
  Permalink
  Flag
  Click "Submit Flag" if you feel this post is inappropriate. Explain why below if you wish.

  Cancel