A few weeks ago I was confirmed as an NGO Observer to monitor the hearings in the 9/11 case at Guantanamo Bay (click here to see my previous posts). It was finally the day to fly from Indianapolis, where I currently live, to Washington DC, where I would catch a military flight at Andrews Air Force Base to take me to Guantanamo Bay. The flight from Andrews to Guantanamo Bay was scheduled for Saturday, October 8, morning, and I was supposed to be at Andrews at 5:30 am.
I was at Atlanta Airport, half way to DC, when I opened my emails and received this message, sent Friday, October 7, at 4:42 pm:
“There has been a change in the flight schedule and you will all now be flying down on island on Monday at 1000. Unfortunately, the number of passengers for tomorrow’s flight exceeded the number of seats available on the aircraft (primarily due to additional personnel that needed to fly down to assess the infrastructure post-storm).”
I was already on my way, so I had to book two extra nights at the DC hotel, and spend the whole weekend in DC.
On Saturday, October 8, Carol Rosenberg (link), a Miami Herald correspondent and one of the passengers of our original Saturday morning flight – that was taking judges, defense councils, prosecution, interpreters, victims and family members, media and others to Guantanamo – tweeted she had to leave the airplane and was not able to go to Guantanamo Bay that day. Apparently information was circulated that the issue was the overweight of the aircraft and the Pentagon needed to solve it to be able to fly around the Hurricane Mathew.
Until that moment, it appears that those on this plane thought only the NGO Observers would be left behind in DC for 2 days. As it turns out, media may have been bumped out the plane, but media’s luggage stayed on board. How would that help effectively resolve overweight issues?
Carol Rosenberg then reported that she noticed the IT support techies were likewise bumped from the flight.
(see more here)
So, I am thinking what kind of additional personnel instead of NGO Observers and media needed to fly down to assess the infrastructure post-storm, if IT techies were not essential.
The transparency we are pursuing seems to be blurred.
Aline Fagundes (LL.M. Candidate, ’17)
NGO Monitor, U.S. Military Commission Observation Project (MCOP)
Program in International Human Rights Law
Indiana University McKinney School of Law
All of my comments above are mine and mine alone, written in my personal capacity, and not in the capacity as a Judge, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Indiana McKinney’s MCOP, the PIHRL, or any other individual or group.