The US government announced that 15 inmates held at the Guantanamo Bay in Cuba have been transferred to the United Arab Emirates.
Advertisement
The United States has sent 15 Guantanamo Bay prisoners to the United Arab Emirates, the largest single transfer of President Obama’s administration.
Most have been held without charge or trial for more than a decade, drawing worldwide condemnation. There is both an intensive internal review process and, for those detainees who clear that process, there’s the additional hurdle-sometimes a very time-consuming hurdle-of finding a country that will take the detainee subject to the security and humane assurances that the review process and other USA legal and policy constraints demand.
Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Qatar have resettled detainees.
A static display shows the belongings of a typical inmate in a prison cell at camp V at the US military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in 2013. Instead, he has pushed to transfer out detainees cleared for release by the federal Periodic Review Board.
Earlier this year, the White House and Pentagon unveiled a nine-page plan to shutter Guantanamo before the end of Obama’s presidency.
President Barack Obama urgently wants to close the facility before he leaves office at the start of next year but has been continually thwarted by Republican lawmakers.
This comes after the president continued to push to close the facility. A State Department official told CNN that in the last 11 months, 55 detainees have been transferred to 13 different countries.
Republicans in the Congress have pledged to fight against bringing any Guantanamo detainees back to the United States.
This is the biggest transfer of prisoners from Guantanamo Bay since Obama came to power.
“Once again, hardened terrorists are being released to foreign countries where they will be a threat”, he said in a statement.
Obaidullah alleges that he was tortured and subjected to other cruel treatment, including beatings and threats of sexual abuse, while in US military custody.
Advertisement
The Guantanamo Bay prison is located on an American naval base in south-eastern Cuba. A recent PPD Poll found just 28 percent of American registered voters supported Obama closing Gitmo, and 59 percent say the administration isn’t being truthful when they claim only 6 percent have returned to the War on Terror battlefield.
