Sunday, November 18, 2007

Guatanamo Myth No. 3 (updated)

The United States Government has been claiming for years that the reason so many of the men slated for release have not left Guantanamo is the fault of the home countries for not working with the U.S. to repatriate the men and/or the fault of the rest of the world for not stepping in and taking those men who cannot go back to their home countries. We (habeas counsel) knew that this was false as many of us have contacted countries willing to take the men and some of those countries have tried to get the State Department to release the men to them. Unfortunately the State Department stalls and ignores... the fault clearly lies with our own inept State Department. Finally we now have a country that is willing to talk about the frustration in trying to work with the State Department to get their men home. Attorney William Teesdale describes his conversation with the Deputy Ambassador to the U.S. from Sudan in his affidavit filed with the DC Circuit Court of Appeals last week. (click on the title to see his affidavit...)
Specifically Teesdale states that the Sudanese government has been trying to repatriate its two citizens at Guantanamo since November 2005 and despite the fact that the men have been cleared for release since that time ...our State Department is just a little too busy to actually get around to finalizing the arrangements and sending them home....