Hopeless

Last week I spoke to a former top military medical commander who pointed out that it's in the U.S.'s interest to treat the Gitmo detainees humanely. He said:

If you’re looking to avoid suicides and a P.R. disaster, I think you’d act in the most dignified, humane way you can.  Keep detainees informed to the degree possible, make them feel comfortable, have some level of trust.  To do otherwise aggravates a sense of helplessness and despair.

Now read this:

MIAMI - The Yemeni captive who killed himself at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, had an attorney arranging to visit him in August, but did not know it when he committed suicide.

One of the Saudis, Mani Shaman al Utaybi, 30, had been approved for transfer to a jail back home, but also had never been told he was cleared to depart the U.S. detention center....

Both Engelhardt and attorney Jeff Davis of Charlotte, N.C., said government lawyers had thwarted repeated attempts to see their clients.

Davis said his firm was notified more than a month ago that Utaybi was approved for transfer back to Saudi Arabia. But the notice came under a seal of secrecy, said Davis, so Utaybi, who had never met his lawyer, did not know he would be sent home - which The Miami Herald confirmed independently.

"I think the humane thing to do when you've decided to change those conditions of confinement, you tell him, particularly if the change is to send him home," said Davis.