GETTING BETTER TREATMENT AT GITMO THAN THEY WOULD AT HOME ??

Gitmo Inmates Rejecting Repatriation in Algeria

 

 

Friday, 29 Nov 2013 09:35 AM

By Sandy Fitzgerald

         Prisoners Fight U.S. Over Gitmo Exit

The Obama administration may be pushing to close the Guantanamo Bay prison, but that doesn't mean all the prisoners want to go home. 
Two Algerian prisoners being held at the Cuban naval base are fighting against being transferred out because they fear Islamist extremists will try to kill them when they discover the repatriated men don't share their views on violence, a lawyer for one of them told The Wall Street Journal. 

Robert Kirsch, who represents detainee Belkacem Bensayah, said sending him and the other Algerian detainee, Djamel Ameziane, back to the North African country is "the most callous, political abuse of these men," and is being done so the Obama administration can show progress on closing the prison.
 

The International Committee of the Red Cross has visited both prisoners for their exit interviews this week, said Kirsch, and has asked the United States to reconsider sending them back to Algeria, a claim the Red Cross has not yet confirmed.
 

They would be returning to Algeria as Islamist violence is growing there and in other North African countries. According to government reports, North Africa now houses 15 al-Qaida affiliates, according to a recent Forbes report, and there have more than 1,000 attacks in Algeria, LIbya, Tunisia, and Morocco since 2010.

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