British foreign secretary says detentions at Guantanamo "unacceptable"

British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett on Thursday lashed out at the U.S. regarding its detention center at Guantanamo Bay, saying the prison camp was "unacceptable in terms of human rights."

"The continuing detention without fair trial of prisoners is unacceptable in terms of human rights. But it is also ineffective in terms of counter-terrorism," Beckett said at the launch of Britain's annual report on human rights around the world.

"It's widely argued now that the existence of the camp is as much a radicalizing and discrediting influence as it is a safeguard for security," she said.

The report called for the camp to be closed.

In response, Washington said it looked forward to the camp's closure but emphasized the need to keep terrorist suspects in prison.

"We don't want to be the world's jailers. We certainly would look forward to the day when Guantanamo is closed," U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said at a daily briefing.

But he stressed that the military camp in Cuba was housing "very dangerous people, including those who were responsible for the attack on this country which killed 3,000 people."

The United States has been widely criticized for human rights violations at the Guantanamo base, where it holds some 450 suspected al-Qaida and Taliban members. Some have been held for more than four years without trial.

Source: Xinhua