IMMEDIATE RELEASE-Detainee Transfer Announced

[kpete]

Source: U.S. Department of Defense

IMMEDIATE RELEASE No. 040-09
January 17, 2009
Detainee Transfer Announced

The Department of Defense announced today the transfer of six detainees from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Four detainees were transferred to Iraq, one to Algeria and one to Afghanistan. These detainees were determined to be eligible for departure following a comprehensive series of review processes.



The transfer is a demonstration of the United States’ desire not to hold detainees any longer than necessary. It also underscores the processes put in place to assess each individual and make a determination about their detention while hostilities are ongoing – an unprecedented step in the history of warfare.



The Department of Defense has determined – through its comprehensive review processes - that approximately 60 detainees at Guantanamo are eligible for transfer or release. Departure of these detainees is subject to ongoing discussions between the United States and other nations.



Since 2002, more than 525 detainees have departed Guantanamo for other countries including Albania, Afghanistan, Australia, Bangladesh, Bahrain, Belgium, Denmark, Egypt, France, Great Britain, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Libya, Maldives, Mauritania, Morocco, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Sweden, Sudan, Tajikistan, Turkey, Uganda, United Kingdom and Yemen.



There are approximately 245 detainees currently at Guantanamo.

Read more: http://www.defenselink.mil/releases/release.aspx?releaseid=12449

[Ichingcarpenter]

1. You know they could testify if they stayed another week

if they were tortured or not. Does anyone question the timing of this?

[elleng]

3. 'Oh, not at all!'

Sound like Embassy, in Iran?

[Ichingcarpenter]

4. Firesale....... Going out of business ..... new owners moving in

Must move merchandise!

[Ichingcarpenter]

17. "We The People'

8 foot by 25 foot panel by Chris Jordan

One of his latest pieces is a rather powerful political statement about the Bush administration's abuses of power and human rights, called "We the People"

It is an image of a piece of the US constitution made out of pictures of abused and illegally detained people, abused and detained by the US. The image "depicts 83,000 Abu Ghraib prisoner photographs, equal to the number of people who have been arrested and held at US-run detention facilities with no trial or other due process of law, during the Bush Administration's war on terror."











You can see his work here:

http://www.chrisjordan.com/current_set2.php?id=7

[crimsonblue]

23. Git Mo hoods. Git Mo car batteries!

that shit was hilarious.

[mallard]

21. Re: 'Does anyone question the timing ...'

Great point! Thanks you for dispelling my ignorance - no minor detail there!

[YvonneCa]

2. A new day dawns...

...:patriot:

[Adsos Letter]

5. "an unprecedented step in the history of warfare"

The North and South held regular prisoner exchanges until about midway through the Civil War; I wonder how this is differentiated from that...other than that whoever we are counting as "the other side" hold no Americans as prisoners as far as I know.

Honest question.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

8. It's not an exchange, is it?

Those took place all the time during the Cold War - we swapped the Soviets' spies for our spooks that the Commies were holding.

Here, they're simply transferring some prisoners, right? Let's hope that's government-speak for "sending them home where they've belonged the whole damn time."

[skooooo]

6. Give credit to Obama.

Man I'm tired of all the complaining about how Obama isn't perfect. Give him a chance and things happen.

[lapfog_1]

7. Before everyone gits all giddy about this...

"departure" and "transfer" does NOT mean released. Far from it.

[skooooo]

9. oh come on..

This is the beginning of the end of Gitmo.

[lapfog_1]

12. Bush is putting them out of Obama's reach...

because otherwise they could testify against him and Dick and all of the Omegas. Right?

[skooooo]

14. Sending them on a "road trip?"

[Ichingcarpenter]

10. I'm suspicious of this not GIDDY

I would like to hear what their defense attorneys say about this.

[angrycarpenter]

11. Never to be seen again.

These men will disappear as if they never existed. Should anyone go looking for them they can always blame it on someone else.

[peacetalksforall]

13. Transfer = move to another prison. Does it not? It means they were tortured

and they are going to a torture prison. They will do a brainwash, then torture then, and make them think they were tortured at the new prison. Whatever the sequence. Yes, I believe they were transferred because they were tortured. They must be removed. The lawyers are coming.

The staring point is this - everything stated from the mouths of this military and administration has been a lie - except Homeland Security and the Patriot Act. The rest has been secrecy.

[struggle4progress]

15. US judges reject delay request in Gitmo hearings

ANDREWS AIR FORCE BASE, Maryland (AP) — Military judges have rejected last-minute requests to postpone Guantanamo war crimes hearings scheduled for the week of President-elect Barack Obama's inauguration, officials said Saturday.

Both the defense and prosecution had sought to delay pretrial hearings scheduled to begin Monday for five men accused of orchestrating the Sept. 11 attacks and a Canadian accused of killing an American soldier with a grenade in Afghanistan.

Defense lawyers have sought to halt the cases — or at least put them on hold pending a review by the Obama administration — while the chief prosecutor, Army Col. Lawrence Morris, said the prosecution was only seeking a brief delay for "efficiency" and legal reasons.

"We're still in business. We're going to court Monday," Morris told reporters at Andrews Air Force, as he and lawyers prepared to board a flight to the U.S. Navy base in Cuba ...

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iCpAiXsS28ctqTC-AqtM0twgv0HQD95P2LC80

[alcibiades_mystery]

18. None of these decisions by this kangaroo court have any standing

Obama could immediately invalidate them all without any review or appeal.

[struggle4progress]

16. Khadr hearing still on despite defence, prosecution request for delay

Guantanamo Bay, Cuba — The U.S. military commission proceedings against Omar Khadr at its infamous Guantanamo Bay prison remained on life support Saturday after a military judge nixed a joint request by both defence and prosecution to delay hearings until incoming U.S. president Barack Obama takes office on Tuesday.

Col. Patrick Parrish's decision late Friday evening came despite the unusual joint plea to call off the military commission proceedings in the "interests of justice."

"Prosecutors' unexpected agreement to the defence requests signals a clear recognition that the commissions are about to be stopped," said Lt.-Cmdr. Bill Kuebler, Khadr's Pentagon-appointed lawyer.

Military officials were playing a game of 'hot potato' in "a final charade before president-elect Obama puts an end to the sham Guantanamo tribunals," he said ...

http://www.google.com/hostednews/canadianpress/article/ALeqM5jW6-CyWX_0FChvTGXAUYB3rTWmSw

[Left Coast2020]

19. He said he would close Gitmo but didn't say when.

[JDPriestly]

20. To Iraq, Algeria and Afghanistan -- I see a problem here.

Rest assured, none of the prisoners are being sent to Iraq or Afghanistan as free people. This is really a transfer to a war zone so that they can be tried by military tribunals. Read the Supreme Court decisions that arose from the Guantanamo cases. I think that in one of them the Court determined that the prisoners had habeas corpus rights but that they might not have those rights if they were actually in a war zone far from U.S. soil. I might be wrong, but I think that is what was stated. This is a way to avoid habeas corpus in my opinion.

[McCamy Taylor]

22. I predicted this. They are being sent to others countries to hide torture here.

Some of them will die or disappear in custody in their new places of incarceration. Others are the Al Qaeda operatives that Cheney has been carefully cultivating for Saudi Arabia. They will be turned loose to do their worst against Obama.

[Ghost Dog]

24. The entire land and sea area of Guantánamo occupied,

under a Treaty no decent fair court in the world would uphold, by the US military should be returned to the Republic of Cuba.

[Solly Mack]

25. Look at the packaging...

a demonstration of the United States’ desire not to hold detainees any longer than necessary


underscores the processes put in place to assess each individual and make a determination about their detention while hostilities are ongoing


an unprecedented step in the history of warfare


Departure of these detainees is subject to ongoing discussions


Snort

[lunatica]

26. Color me suspicious. If the Bush administration did this then it's a cynical

move to undermine the next administration. Like Poppy Bush invading Somalia when he was leaving. He forced Clinton to inherit the mess, and it was a mess. Now history remembers that it was Clinton's Blackhawk down mess and never mentions G H W Bush's role in starting that mess.

Nothing Bush or Cheney do is on the up and up. It's anathema to them to do anything that doesn't have their PNAC goal in mind. They're probably 'relocating' or 'transfering' at least one prisoner who they know has terrorist connections. Or one who's entire family was killed by us and who will dedicate the rest of his life to avenging them.

It's probably one of the practices commonly used in the CIA since Poppy's time as Director there. Create an American enemy and then release him to justify your next invasion. What? They wouldn't do that... Yeah, sure...

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

27. "...the United States’ desire not to hold detainees any longer than necessary."

Cutting it close, what with only a couple days left.

I wonder why they're interested in getting these particular individuals out of the country before Tuesday?

[Piewhacket]

28. You are SUCH a cynic...

but I had the same question... seriously.
Someone should look closely at those particular case files, especially
for anything that is 'missing'.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

29. ...but I wish I didn't have to be.

[Piewhacket]

30. thats the real tragedy, the liars always win.

To advance, we must trust.
A liar takes advantage of that necessity.
they always win.
For if they aren't caught, they win.
If they are caught they have made us cynics,
and we cannot trust, we cannot advance, so they win.

The art of war is founded on deceit. It is how you destroy.
A liar declares himself our mortal enemy.
What should be done with liars when we catch them?
And when the liar is our government's highest officials? What then?

And you think YOU are a cynic. Please sir, get in line behind ME. :)

[alarimer]

31. Notice they transfer them to places where no one is likely to notice them.

They can be tortured out of the eyes of the media. This unfortunately is what is going to happen even after Obama takes office. The CIA will still do all of its usual dirty tricks; they'll just do them somewhere less public. They always have. I wonder if Panetta will have the guts to stop it.