More treachery at Guantanamo

by via Daily Star, Lebanon

Mon, Nov 3, 2008 7:32AM

Monday, November 3, 2008 : For many of the prisoners at Guantanamo, the forthcoming US presidential election holds little promise of change. Although both Barack Obama and John McCain have pledged to close Guantanamo, the problem for at least 50 of the 261 prisoners still held at the prison is not that the US government is unwilling to release them, but that there is nowhere for them to go.

These men are from countries including Algeria, China, Libya, Tunisian and Uzbekistan. Although they have been approved for release after multiple military review boards - some for at least three years - they cannot be repatriated because of international treaties preventing the return of foreign nationals to countries with poor human rights records, where they face the risk of torture. Attempts to find other countries willing to take them have also failed (with the exception of Albania, which accepted eight former prisoners in 2006), in part because, although they are approved for release, the government insists on maintaining that they are still "illegal enemy combatants."

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