RIYADH, 27 October — Lawyers representing hundreds of Guantanamo prisoners yesterday welcomed a US plan to release some of the detainees but urged Washington to speed up the action.
“We urge the United States to translate words into deeds and to accelerate the process of releasing the inmates,” said Kateb Al-Shemmari, secretary of the International Committee for the Defense of Guantanamo Prisoners.
“The release of any detainee certainly helps the case, but we want the process to be at a faster rate in line with human rights and principles of international law,” Shemmari said.
“The US administration has started to show understanding of the conditions of the prisoners who have spent months in this infamous center,” he added. The Saudi lawyer was commenting on remarks by a US defense official that US military authorities were planning to release at least four prisoners detained at the US naval base in Cuba. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on Tuesday disclosed the plan to release a small number of prisoners who have been judged to be of no intelligence value or not a threat. Others could follow after the first release, he said
The defense official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said two of the four people slated for release are elderly. The committee, formed by prominent Gulf lawyers and headed by former Qatari justice minister Najeeb Al-Nuaimi, will visit Washington shortly to discuss steps to sue the US administration with US law firms.
“The detention of these people is a breach of international law and the Geneva convention for the treatment of prisoners of war, and is in contradiction with personal freedom and human rights,” Shemmari said.
