laserblue said:
yankcitizen76 said:
Fellow members. I am having a real big problem with this issue. I love City but am not cool with the idea of the owners as human rights violators. I realize that the Sheik who owns us may not be directly involved, but he's still part of the ruling family. I've asked several family members of mine, and all they can say is, "how much is your morality worth?" Is it possible to support the team but dislike the owners. In their defense, they've put quite a bit of money behind the team and are directly related to our resurgence. But it is obvious they are using the team for good publicity. The same way they plan to use the New York City franchise.
Can someone put this issue in perspective for me?
Says the man whose president sanctioned Guantanamo Bay, Extraordinary Rendition and waterboarding.
Shaker Aamer (born 12 December 1968) is a Saudi Arabian citizen and the last British resident held by the United States in the Guantanamo Bay detention camps in Cuba.[2] He was arrested in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, on 24 November 2001 and was rendered to Guantánamo on 14 February 2002, where he has now been held for 11 years, 5 months, and 12 days without trial or charge.[3][4][5]
According to documents published in the Guantanamo Bay files leak, the US military Joint Task Force Guantanamo believed in November 2007 that Aamer had led a unit of fighters in Afghanistan, including the Battle of Tora Bora, while his family was paid a stipend by Osama bin Laden. The file asserts past associations with Richard Reid and Zacarias Moussaoui.[6][7] Clive Stafford Smith, a human rights lawyer, said the leaked documents would not stand up in court. He claimed out that part of the evidence comes from an unreliable witness and that confessions Aamer made had been obtained through torture.[8][9] Aamer’s father-in-law, Saaed Ahmed Siddique, said: "All of these claims have no basis. If any of this was true he would be in a court now."[10] The Bush administration acknowledged later that it had no evidence against Aamer.[11]
Aamer has never been charged with any wrongdoing, has never received a trial, and his lawyer says he is "totally innocent."[12][13] He was cleared for release by the Bush administration in 2007, and the Obama administration in 2009[13] but remains in Guantánamo. He has been described as a charismatic leader who spoke up and fought for the rights of fellow prisoners and some have speculated that this might be a reason for his continued detention. Aamer says that he has been subject to torture while in detention.[14]
Aamer's mental and physical health has been declining over the years, as he has participated in hunger strikes to protest detention condition and been held in solitary confinement much of the time. He has lost 40 per cent of his body weight in captivity.[15][16][17] After a visit in November 2011, Clive Stafford Smith said, "I do not think it is stretching matters to say that he is gradually dying in Guantanamo Bay."[18] The UK government has been demanding his release for years, and many people there have repeatedly called for his release
