Venezuelan Carlos the Jackal, the 1960s yeayyy—babeee Austin—Powers—era terrorist who sits whining in a French jail these days, has lost his case with the European Court of Human Rights. He told the court his human rights were being violated because he never got the full luxurious Gitmo treatment accorded to less—glamorous Taliban—style terrorists. Instead, he was stuck in a French jail with only French accommodations ... like his own TV set, two hour daily walks, a hour in the exercise room, twice—weekly visits from a doctor, once—weekly visits from a priest, a window to see daylight, a washstand and his own bed. But it wasn't good enough compared to what the Zarqawi types got at Gitmo and he wanted more.

 

The Jackal, if you've never heard of him, was a terrorist before his time. During the 1990s, while Bill Clinton was turning away a Sudanese offer to hand over Osama bin Laden, the French took up them up on their offer to fork over the Jackal, who was hiding in Sudan. The French gendarmes flew in and quelle surprise! hauled The Jackal back to Paris in a sack.

 

Much to his regret, the Jackal never got any of the bleeding—hearts and human—rights activists of the Eurozone to take up his cause the way the scraggly 9/11—era Middle Eastern terrorists did. So while the latter get Korans, prayer rugs, visitors, halal food, lots of exercise, reading lessons, early releases, and any other luxury the Eurozone can force the Yanks to relent on, the Jackal, whose murder spree extended all through the 1960s and 1970s, only got a crummy French jail cell run by Casablanca—style inspectors and fan mail only from Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez.

 

Bin Laden didn't even send flowers!

 

It's no fun being out of the limelight. Now a Euro—court has told him to beat it. But this court being European, it didn't send him away empty handed. It offered him a consolation prize of $12,800 in "damages" supposedly because the French didn't act quickly enough the first time he kvetched about his conditions. The Jackal's 58 lawyers should be happy.

 

A.M. Mora y Leon 07 04 06