Geneva, January 15 (RHC)-- Human rights experts from the United Nations and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) have called on the United States government to promptly close its prison at Guantánamo and end impunity for abuses in the so-called ‘global war on terror’ such as ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ and extraordinary rendition.

On the 14th anniversary of opening the prison, the experts say in an open letter: “The United States must clean up its own house – impunity only generates more abuses as states do not feel compelled to stop engaging in illegal practices.”

“Everyone implicated, including at the highest level of authority, must be held accountable for ordering or executing extraordinary renditions, secret detention, arbitrary arrest of civilians and so-called ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ in the name of combatting terrorism,” the human rights experts said in a press statement on the letter.

The open letter calls for an immediate end to the prolonged arbitrary detention of all detainees in Guantánamo, located on illegally-occupied Cuban territory.

The signatories include the UN special rapporteurs on torture, Juan E. Méndez; on human rights and counterterrorism, Ben Emmerson; on independence of the judiciary, Mónica Pinto; the chair-rapporteur of the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, Seong-Phil Hong; and the director of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, Michael Georg Link.