MIAMI – Human rights groups are asking Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel to order troops to abandon the force-feeding of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, a move that could permit them starve to death if they choose.
The American Civil Liberties Union, Center for Victims of Torture, Human Rights Watch and 17 other groups wrote the Pentagon on Monday, hours after the Qatar-based Al-Jazeera website posted the prison's 30-page forced-feeding procedures with the headline "military document lays bare the brutality of force-feeding."
The letter called Guantanamo's force-feeding process "cruel, inhuman, and degrading."
"We urgently request that you order the immediate and permanent cessation of all force-feeding of Guantanamo prisoners who are competent and capable of forming a rational judgment as to the consequences of refusing food," they wrote.
The letter also asked Hagel to allow "independent medical professionals" access to the prison to "review and monitor the status of hunger-striking prisoners in a manner consistent with international ethical standards."
A surgeon, Navy Capt. Daryl K. Daniels, took charge of the medical team on Friday.
As of Tuesday, the U.S. military counted 100 of the 166 captives there as hunger strikers. It said 29 prisoners were being force-fed, five of them at the detention center hospital.
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