The Red Cross has finally come out and criticized the indefinite detentions of detainees at Guantanamo Bay:

A senior official of the International Committee of the Red Cross said on Thursday that the holding of more than 600 detainees here was unacceptable because they were being held for open-ended terms without proper legal process.

Christophe Girod, the senior Red Cross official in Washington....said that it was intolerable that the complex was used as "an investigation center, not a detention center."

Girod said he's going public with the charge because of the U.S.'s inaction on the detainees.

Mr. Girod said, "The open-endedness of the situation and its impact on the mental health of the population has become a major problem." In 18 months, 21 detainees have made 32 suicide attempts, and human rights groups have said the high incidence of such events, as well as the number of detainees being treated for clinical depression, was a direct result of the uncertainties of their situations.

Griod said the number one question asked by detainees is, "What's going to happen to me.?"

You can read more of Griod's views here.

The Washington Post Friday has an excellent editorial on the detainees, The Court's Conscience. It discusses Fred Korematsu, and the brief he has filed in the Supreme Court supporting the Guantanamo detainees. The Post says,

Mr. Korematsu's brief is an important reminder that "we tend too quickly to sacrifice . . . liberties in the face of overbroad claims of military necessity" and that courts "have too often deferred to exaggerated claims of military necessity and failed to insist that measures curtailing constitutional rights be carefully justified and narrowly tailored."