Pentagon Documents Show Inconsistent Decisions on Prisoner Transfers at Guantanamo Bay

[babylonsister]

Files raise questions on Gitmo transfers

Pentagon Documents Show Inconsistent Decisions on Prisoner Transfers at Guantanamo Bay

ANDREW O. SELSKY
AP News

Oct 03, 2007 03:37 EDT

Two dozen prisoners were cleared for transfer from Guantanamo Bay last year even though U.S. military panels found they still posed a threat to the United States and its allies.

Dozens more were cleared even though they didn't show up for their hearings. One Saudi arrested in Afghanistan was approved for release after offering a peculiar account that he had gone to the Taliban-controlled country to lose weight.

Pentagon documents obtained by The Associated Press show seemingly inconsistent decisions to release men declared by the Bush administration to be among America's most-hardened enemies. Coupled with accusations that some detainees have been held for years on little evidence, the decisions raise questions about whether they were arbitrary.

Human rights groups contend the documents show the military panels, known as Administrative Review Boards, often are overridden by political expediency at Guantanamo, where about 340 men are still held.

"What it says on your passport is more important than what it says in your ARB," said Ben Wizner, an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union, noting that European citizens at Guantanamo were among the first to get out amid intense lobbying by their countries. "It's all about diplomatic pressure."

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