Strasbourg, 13/03/2015 (Agence Europe) - In a decision published on Friday 13 March, the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe (CoE) has called on Poland to take urgent action to obtain guarantees from the United States that two prisoners being held in Guantanamo who suffered torture in Poland in one of the CIA's secret prisons will be treated fairly and justly.
The Committee of Ministers' text makes reference to the ruling pronounced on 17 February by the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights. The Strasbourg-based court rejected Poland's appeal against the decision of 24 July 2014 that it had hosted a secret jail where, in 2002 and 2003, Abu Zubaydah Husayn, a citizen of the Palestinian territories, and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, a Saudi national, were tortured. The two have since been transferred to the US military prison camp at Guantanamo (Cuba).
The latter, thought to be one of Osama bin Laden's lieutenants could be sentenced to death, a punishment contrary to the European Convention on Human Rights (Article 1), the founding text of the jurisprudence of the Court of Human Rights. The court and, therefore, the Committee of Ministers consider that Poland has a moral duty towards the two prisoners who were tortured illegally on its soil and call on it to obtain assurances that al-Nashiri will not receive the death penalty.
That the two face a flagrant denial of justice is another source of concern for the Committee of Ministers. Al-Nashiri was judged by military court which could use evidence obtained through torture, states the text, which points out that Husayn - held without trial since 2002 - could, if charged, face a similar trial before a military court. Here, too, the Committee of Ministers calls on Poland to intervene swiftly to obtain US assurances of a trial in line with Council of Europe standards.
The “moral duty” of the 47 CoE member states is to do all in their power to ensure that the Articles of the European Convention on Human Rights are properly applied, including in countries where the Convention is not in effect and, in particular, where there are breaches as serious as those constituted by torture and the death penalty.
The Committee of Ministers is the CoE's decision-making body. It is made up of the foreign ministers of all the member states or their permanent representatives in Strasbourg. In collaboration with the Parliamentary Assembly, it is the guardian of the Council's fundamental values, and monitors member states' compliance with their undertakings. (Véronique Leblanc)