Guantanamo hearing's surreal quality

"One does not have to make very many salads to know that olive oil isn't water-soluble," said Steven Miles, internist and bioethicist at the University of Minnesota, by way of explaining why a salad-dressing ingredient should never be used to insert force-feeding tubes up a detainee's nose, twice daily.

A water-soluble lubricant should be used as it doesn't lead to long-term lung damage, as olive oil can.

"For some reason that is totally unknown to me, they were using olive oil for this man," Miles said, referring to Syrian Abu Wa'el Dhiab, a detainee at Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba, whose case against the Obama administration is currently being heard in DC. Such is the surreal quality of argument in this case - the first of its kind in a US District Court.

It's not about why Dhiab, who has never been charged with a crime, has spent 12 years of his life in prison under such conditions. Nor is it about why he hasn't been reunited with his family even though he's been cleared with release since 2009.

http://blogs.aljazeera.com/blog/americas/guantanamo-hearings-surreal-quality