Fourteen years ago on Monday, the first wave of detainees arrived at the notorious U.S. military prison at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba.
Seven years ago, President-elect Barack Obama promised that he would close the detention center within one year.
Yet as of January 11, 2016, just over 100 men—dozens already cleared for transfer, and the vast majority never charged with a crime—remain at Gitmo.
According to a call-to-action from a coalition of human rights activists, torture survivors, Guantánamo attorneys, and members of diverse faith communities, “Some remain on hunger strike and are force-fed, and a handful are facing charges in unfair trials. There has been no accountability for the torture that many detainees have suffered.”
Gitmo, the groups say, “is the bitter legacy of a politics of fear, which must be rejected.”
And so on Monday, in Washington, D.C., London, South Florida, and elsewhere, demonstrators will repeat the demand they’ve put forth for more than a decade: Close Guantánamo now.
For Obama and his administration, time is running out—fast.
“Every year, for the last seven years, concerned activists and citizens have called on President Obama to fulfill his promise during his first year in office and demanded that Guantánamo be closed once and for all; every year, these calls have remained unheeded,” said Dr. Zainab Chaudry of Interfaith Action for Human Rights. “This is President Obama’s final year in office. That means this is also his final opportunity to follow through on his promise, shut down Guantanamo, and restore some semblance of dignity to our justice system. This opportunity must not be left ignored.”
Describing the prison as “a moral disaster zone,” Rev. Ron Stief, executive director of the National Religious Campaign Against Torture, added: “It would be a grave sin and a national disgrace for President Obama to leave office without closing Guantánamo.”
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