Officials said on Monday that 15 inmates from the Guantanamo prison were transferred to the United Arab Emirates, the single largest transfer of Guantanamo detainees during President Barack Obama’s administration. The administration has been working with other countries to resettle detainees who have been cleared for transfer.
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“The president’s recklessness with our national security is breathtaking”, said Hudson.
“It is reckless for the administration to continue to release terrorists like these to fulfill a misguided campaign promise to empty and close Guantanamo”, Sen.
Also on Monday, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals unanimously said that a 2006 law that created military commissions prevented former Guantanamo Bay detainee Mohammed Jawad from suing the U.S. government in U.S. courts for damages over torture.
“It is expected that similar releases might follow to other allied countries to end once and for all the Guantanamo detention, which not only is a source of embarrassment for the United States, but a national security threat since the unlawful incarceration of individuals without trial helps to radicalise and recruit more terrorists”. Afghanistan has accepted the most, at 203 inmates.
According to recent report in the Washington Post, citing a confidential source, at least 12 former detainees have been linked to attacks on Americans overseas following their release. Since that report however, the administration has refused to elaborate on his comments saying that the information was classified.
Mr Obama urgently wants to close the facility before he leaves office at the start of next year, but he has been continually thwarted by Republican lawmakers.
Obama is facing fierce opposition from Republicans who assert releasing all of these once-suspected terrorists will come back to haunt the United States.
The argument that Guantanamo prisoners should not be released, transferred to other countries or brought to the United States, is based on concern that they hold bitter views toward the United States and might return to combat against USA forces or against Americans at home.
When Obama took office in 2009, 242 detainees remained at Guantanamo. As People’s Pundit Daily has repeatedly reported, Americans overall are against the closure of Guantanamo Bay, which opened in January 2002 and now only houses 61 detainees suspected of links to the Taliban or Al Qaeda.
The move to close the prison is welcome to human rights groups that say the prison weakens U.S. efforts to discourage torture and unlawful detention in other countries.
Thus far, the Obama administration’s strategy has consisted of transferring as many detainees as safely possible and exploring prosecution for others, according to a White House official.
Congressman Richard Hudson, center, talks with Robin Bridges, left, and Scott Dorney, right, both of the North Carolina Military Business Center, at Fayetteville Technical Community College on Friday, May 27, 2016. “As the number of men at Guantanamo dwindles, so does any rationale for keeping the detention camp open”.
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Officials wouldn’t discuss specific security arrangements, but people familiar with the matter said the US typically conducts electronic surveillance of former detainees, while local authorities keep physical tabs on them.
