Guantanamo judge hears arguments on no-touch order for female guards
By Lacey Johnson FORT MEADE, Md. (Reuters) - A former Guantanamo Bay commander at a section of the U.S. prison that houses alleged Sept. 11 conspirators testified on Wednesday that barring female guards from touching prisoners increased risks and hurt morale. Judge Army Colonel James Pohl issued the temporary no-touch order in January after Muslim detainees complained that physical contact with women outside their immediate families went against their religion. Pohl could rule to revise the temporary order this week. “There were strains throughout my deployment ... trying to uphold that order,” said the former commander, who testified via streaming video under the pseudonym Major Prior. “It increased the overall risk,” he said. “We have unpredictable detainees within these facilities.” Major Prior ran Camp Seven, the secret part of the prison in Cuba where the United States keeps former Central Intelligence Agency captives. When asked whether he could cite a specific security breach as a result of the no-touch order, the commander said there were none. He commanded Camp Seven from December 2014 through August 2015. Female guards “felt they were second-class citizens,” said Major Prior. “I have soldiers ... that will be getting out of the military because of this, and that’s an embarrassment to our armed forces.” A previous Camp Seven commander testified on Tuesday that the no-touch order could affect the career progress of female guards compared to their male peers. The testimony was given during a pre-trial hearing for five men charged with conspiring with militants who slammed hijacked airliners into New York's World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a Pennsylvania field on Sept. 11, 2001. Almost 3,000 people died in the attacks. In October, Defense Secretary Ashton Carter described the order as “outrageous” during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing. The hearing was monitored by closed circuit television from a media centre at Fort Meade, outside Washington, D.C. (Editing by Alan Crosby)
