More Gitmo Detainees on Hunger Strike
The number of detainees on hunger strike at the U.S. military detention facility in Guantanamo Bay has more than doubled in the last week to 84, an official said Thursday.
Forty-six detainees joined 38 already on strike on December 25, said Guantanamo spokesman Lt. Col. Jeremy Martin, who added that the number of fasting detainees “routinely fluctuates.”
“On the anniversary of September 11, the number of strikers spiked to 131,” Martin said. “They steadily decreased over the weeks and months until December 25, and then they spiked again.”
Thirty-two fasting detainees were being fed through tubes, either through their noses or intravenously.
The military classifies detainees who miss nine straight meals as being on a hunger strike. The current fast began August 8.
Many of the detainees at Guantanamo have been held more than 3 1/2 years without charge or access to lawyers. Most were captured in Afghanistan and are suspected of ties to al Qaeda or the ousted Taliban regime that sheltered the terrorist network.
Source: CNN.
There are currently no comments on this thread.