Guantanamo detainee population to be reduced by 70%

[Cylinder]

From the Washinton Post story:

The Bush administration is negotiating the transfer of nearly 70 percent of the detainees at the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to three countries as part of a plan, officials said, to share the burden of keeping suspected terrorists behind bars.

U.S. officials announced yesterday that they have reached an agreement with the government of Afghanistan to transfer most of its nationals to Kabul's "exclusive" control and custody. There are 110 Afghan detainees at Guantanamo and 350 more at the Bagram airfield near Kabul. Their transfers could begin in the next six months.

Pierre-Richard Prosper, ambassador at large for war crimes, who led a U.S. delegation to the Middle East this week, said similar agreements are being pursued with Saudi Arabia and Yemen, whose nationals make up a significant percentage of the Guantanamo population. Prosper held talks in Saudi Arabia on Sunday and Monday, but negotiations were cut off after the announcement of King Fahd's death.

The decision to move more than 20 percent of the detainees at Guantanamo to Afghanistan and to largely clear out the detention center at Bagram is part of a broader plan to significantly reduce the population of "enemy combatants" in U.S. custody. Senior U.S. officials said yesterday's agreement is the first major step toward whittling down the Guantanamo population to a core group of people the United States expects to hold indefinitely.

An Afgan prison or US custody at Guantanamo?

A Saudi prison or US custody at Guantanamo?

A Yemini prison or US custody at Guantanamo?

 

[Skeptic]

From the Washinton Post story:




An Afgan prison or US custody at Guantanamo?

A Saudi prison or US custody at Guantanamo?

A Yemini prison or US custody at Guantanamo?

One thing's for damn sure: the "human rights" people, so deeply concerned about the detainees when they are in Guatanamo, will instantly forget them them moment they are moved to a Saudi / Afghani / whatever prison.

 

[Tony]

Re: Re: Guantanamo detainee population to be reduced by 70%

One thing's for damn sure: the "human rights" people, so deeply concerned about the detainees when they are in Guatanamo, will instantly forget them them moment they are moved to a Saudi / Afghani / whatever prison.

You must be taking lessons from Professor Trelawney.

 

[Manny]

Heh. I'll take "Be Careful What You Wish For" for $400, Alex.

AI and the ACLU wanted civilian courts to have jurisdiction over these guys? Well they'll get it. A Saudi civilian court.

 

[BPSCG]

An Afgan prison or US custody at Guantanamo?

A Saudi prison or US custody at Guantanamo?

A Yemini prison or US custody at Guantanamo?

"No, no, wait!!! We meant a French prison or a Swedish prison!!! Why can't we get a Martha Stewart prison??? It's not f-a-i-r!!!!"

 

[Just thinking]

Re: Re: Guantanamo detainee population to be reduced by 70%

One thing's for damn sure: the "human rights" people, so deeply concerned about the detainees when they are in Guatanamo, will instantly forget them them moment they are moved to a Saudi / Afghani / whatever prison.

Who ... ?

What ... ?

What square in China was that? Nothing ever happened there.

 

[Bjorn]

Re: Re: Guantanamo detainee population to be reduced by 70%

One thing's for damn sure: the "human rights" people, so deeply concerned about the detainees when they are in Guatanamo, will instantly forget them them moment they are moved to a Saudi / Afghani / whatever prison.

If you think of Amnesty International as the "human rights people" (aren't you for human rights yourself, by the way?), you are dead wrong - they have been worried about this kind of transfer for a long time:

it seems that in the wake of the Rasul ruling, the subsequent decisions by Judges Robertson and Green, and the prospect of further losses in the courts, the Pentagon may be intending to transfer scores of detainees out of Guantánamo. Some of them may be transferred to detention in other countries, including Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia and Yemen.(508) Lawyers who have been filing habeas corpus petitions for the detainees have responded by seeking temporary restraining orders and injunctions in the US courts preventing the transfers of detainees where there is concern that they may face torture or other ill-treatment. Incommunicado or secret detention can per se amount to such ill-treatment.

...........

US District Judge Reggie B. Walton, appointed to the Court by President George W. Bush in 2001, was faced with a similar petition filed on behalf of six Bahraini detainees seeking that they would not be transferred without 30 days notice being given to the court and to the lawyers, including notice of the intended transfer destination. Again the government opposed the detainees’ motion on the grounds that the detainees’ fears that they would be transferred to situations where they risked torture, death or continued detention without trial were "based on rumors, myths, and hype".

http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGAMR510632005