In 1902, when Cuba was still under military occupation by U.S. troops who had invaded ostensibly to bring freedom, the nation was forced to incorporate Washington's Platt Amendment into its constitution. The Platt Amendment gave the United States the right to lease a 45-square-mile area at Guantanamo Bay. The lease specifies that the area is "for use as coaling or naval stations only, and for no other purpose."
Use of the base as a prison began in November 1991. After the first overthrow of the elected government of President Jean Bertrand Aristide, this time under the first Bush Administration, Washington announced it would build a "tent shelter" at Guantanamo for thousands of Haitians fleeing the military dictatorship. The "shelter" was surrounded by barbed wire and guarded by U.S. troops.
When forced repatriation began in February 1992, the argument used by the George H.W. Bush administration presaged the 2004 argument before the Supreme Court by the George W. Bush administration: the detainees were not entitled to any U.S. rights because they were being held on territory under the sovereignty of Cuba.
In June 1993, when only HIV refugees along with their relatives remained, a federal judge ordered the camp closed, calling it "nothing more than an HIV prison camp," where, "surrounded by razor barbed wire" and "subjected to pre-dawn military sweeps," people lived under continual threat of abuse by "400 soldiers in full riot gear." However, thousands of Haitians were again detained at Guantanamo in 1994, leading to uprisings.
At the same time, Washington built a huge tent city surrounded by barbed wire to detain Cubans who were attempting to reach the United States. Miserable conditions led some Cuban detainees to attempt suicide. Their numerous uprisings were met by U.S. troops in riot gear with fixed bayonets. Some Cubans managed to escape back to unoccupied Cuba by scaling the barbed wire, climbing down a 40-foot cliff and swimming about a mile to Cuban territory. Children suffered from bronchial viruses, pneumonia, diarrhea, and fear.
On January 18, 1995, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta ruled that detainees at Guantanamo could be forcibly repatriated because constitutional rights "bind the government only when the refugees are at or within the borders of the United States."
Jane Franklin/Z-net 22.Oct.04
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link KWSnet
GUANTANAMERA (Lyrics: Jose Marti, music adapted by Pete Seeger)
