Brussels, 23/01/2002 (Agence Europe) - Given the controversy that has been swelling since the diffusion by the Pentagon of photos of Taliban and Al-Qaida prisoners held at the Guantanamo base handcuffed and gagged, Europe now seems to be coming out of its reserve. Until now, the European Commission had simply declared that it was waiting for the results of a visit to the camp made by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) before possibly taking action. On Tuesday, CFSP High Representative Javier Solana pointed out that the Guantanamo Bay prisoners are entitled to the rights conferred by the Geneva Convention. Chris Patten, External Relations Commissioner, declared on the BBC that Europe "wants justice not vengeance". He went on to say that one must be correct with the vanquished, even if they are dangerous. Application of the Geneva Convention will be reviewed, he said, adding that the death sentence cannot be applied by military courts, as this would make the international coalition lose the credibility and integrity it has so far enjoyed.
The current President of the EU Council of Ministers, Josep Piqué, attenuated, on Wednesday, the conciliating remarks he had made the day before concerning the conditions of detention in Guantanamo Bay camp. The Spanish Foreign Minister had said he did not consider it necessary to make a statement on the matter, as he had "no doubt that the great North American democracy would respect human rights". In an interview on the third Spanish television channel, he corrected this statement, saying that he was personally somewhat "surprised and uneasy" about the pictures of prisoners bound and masked. "If I am allowed to express a personal opinion, which is something I should not do, I would say that they are practically prisoners of war and that I would prefer to have the [Geneva] Convention applied to them", he added.