BIDEN AIMS TO CLOSE GUANTANAMO BAY PRISON, NO TIMELINE SET

Tue 20 July 2021:

The Biden administration is aiming to close down the US military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba for good as it works to transfer its remaining detainees out of the facility, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said during a new conference on Monday.

President Joe Biden’s administration said on Monday that it had transferred its first detainee from the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, a Moroccan man imprisoned since 2002, lowering the population at the facility to 39.

Abdul Latif Nasir, 56, was repatriated to Morocco.

Nasir had been cleared for release in 2016 during the Obama administration before Trump took office. Most of the prisoners left at Guantanamo Bay have been held for nearly two decades without being charged or tried.

“The (Biden) administration is dedicated to following a deliberate and thorough process focused on responsibly reducing the detainee population of the Guantanamo facility while also safeguarding the security of the United States and its allies,” State Department spokesman Ned Price said in a statement.

“Yes, our goal is to close Guantanamo Bay… I don’t have a timeline for you. As you know, there’s a process, there are different layers of the process, but that remains our goal and we are considering all available avenues to responsibly transfer detainees and, of course, close Guantanamo Bay,” said during a new conference on Monday.

“The Biden administration urgently needs to negotiate and implement similar decisions for other cleared prisoners,” said Hina Shamsi, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s national security project.

“Bringing an end to two decades of unjust and abusive military detention of Muslim men at Guantanamo is a human rights obligation and a national security necessity,” Shamsi said.

[File Photo: Mike Theiler/Reuters]

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