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France Reportedly Urging EU Nations To Accept Guantanamo Prisoners

By blueness

The German magazine Der Spiegel reported Saturday that France has drafted a plan for European Union countries to accept 60 of the remaining 245 prisoners confined in the soon-to-be-shuttered prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.

President Obama issued an executive order Thursday directing that "[t]he detention facilities at Guant?namo . . . shall be closed as soon as practicable, and no later than one year from the date of this order."

The order directs the new administration to "undertake a prompt and thorough review of the factual and legal bases for the continued detention of all individuals currently held at Guant?namo," and notes that "new diplomatic efforts may result in an appropriate disposition of a substantial number of individuals currently detained at Guant?namo."  

Most EU nations have long condemned the Guantanamo facilities. Some of those nations, however, cooperated with BushCo in other, equally unpalatable areas of the War on Terra. Thus, the Swiss statesman Dick Marty observes, "it's fair that European countries try to help find a solution to this problem because European countries actively, or at least passively, collaborated in the commission of unlawful acts in the name of this so-called war against terrorism."
According to the German publication Deutsche Welle, France and Portugal are willing to accept Guantanamo refugees, while Sweden and the Netherlands have huffily declined. So has Austria. It has previously been reported that Switzerland has offered to accept Guantanamo refugees who cannot return to their home countries.

"For Switzerland, the detention of people in Guantanamo is in conflict with international law. Switzerland is ready to consider how it can contribute to the solution of the Guantanamo problem," the government said in a statement.

Deutsche Welle notes that the Germans, who, ahem, know something about mistreating people, are bickering amongst themselves about whether to accept Guantanamo refugees.

Germany's government is itself split over the issue. While Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, a Social Democrat, is in favor of hosting inmates, Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble, a conservative, is against such a move.

Talks on the subject are scheduled between the two ministers, who are eager to score political points ahead of a general election looming in Germany later in the year.

Amid this political posturing, Murat Kurnaz, a German Turk interned in Guantanamo for four years, has requested that his government express "active regret" for failing to act quicker in his case.

Recognixing that some EU member states are apparently unwilling to do the right thing, the French proposal reportedly accepts that each EU nation should decide for itself whether to take in Guantanamo refugees considered innocent but who may not return to their home countries for fear of torture, imprisonment, or other persecution.

The French foreign ministry declined comment on the Der Spiegel article, referring instead to a statement issued Friday: "We have said we were ready to favourably consider, on a case by case basis, individual requests that we may receive concerning prisoners freed from Guantanamo." The French proposal was apparently sent to EU capitals in advance of a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Brussels on Monday.

Der Spiegel notes that the French proposal would make EU funds available "to give traumatized former detainess psychological counseling."  

Full post as published by Never In Our Names on January 24, 2009 (boomark / email).