1. Introduction
Amnesty International was right to declare the U.S. Naval Station at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, “the gulag of our times."1 For many in the United States and internationally, the prison evokes disparate thoughts and images – the Twin Towers falling, hooded men chained and kneeling in orange jumpsuits under a relentless tropical sun, and the filth and stench of torture deemed legal by government attorneys who ignored or twisted precedent to achieve desired conclusions. It also raises questions that individuals and governments grapple with frequently – how to stop terrorism and balance security and civil liberties. Yet now, in its twelfth year of operation, there is little doubt that Guantánamo is a failure. It is notorious among modern and developing nations alike for “entrenching the practice of arbitrary detention in violation of international law," and its “mockery of justice and due process."2 It is a prison that in practice, if not by design, has been reserved exclusively for Muslim men and boys who have been so vilified as to be deemed unworthy of the protections of U.S. and international law.
