Amnesty International Strikes Back

Dubya, Sith Lord

The Nobel Peace Price-winning organization Amnesty International has responded in the NY Times to Bush's claims that their report on Gitmo being a "present day Gulag" as absurd. Kate Gilmore, the executive deputy secretary general of AI, said the administration's response was "typical of a government on the defensive." William F. Schultz, executive director of the group's US branch, pointed out that the administration often cites its reports when that suits its purposes. "If our reports are so 'absurd,' why did the administration repeatedly cite our findings about Saddam Hussein before the Iraq war?" wrote Schultz. "Why does it welcome our criticisms of Cuba, China and North Korea? And why does it cite our research in its own annual human rights reports?" Dubya retorted: "Hey, that was until you became Freedom Haters!"