KUWAIT CITY, 21 July 2003 — Anxious relatives of 12 Kuwaiti terror suspects being held at a US Navy base in Cuba are demanding a fair trial, or release, for the detainees in return for Kuwait’s support in the war on Iraq, a spokesman for the families said yesterday.

“Put them on trial in a fair court, give them the chance to defend themselves, and if you don’t have any evidence against them, set them free,” said Khaled Al-Oda, a retired military pilot whose 25-year-old son, Fawzi, is one of about 680 people from 42 countries held in Guantanamo Bay as of Friday.

Al-Oda said Washington should “show appreciation” to Kuwait for allowing US forces to use its territory as a launch pad for the war on neighboring Iraq that toppled the regime of Saddam Hussein.

The United States is preparing military tribunals to try the Guantanamo detainees accused of links to Osama Bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda terror network and Afghanistan’s fallen Taleban regime.

Many of the detainees were arrested almost two years ago following the US-led war on Afghanistan launched following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, which are blamed on Al-Qaeda.

Dozens of detainees, including Pakistanis and Afghans, have been released recently from the high-security prison in Cuba, while several others have arrived. “We are very happy that others are being released, but where are the Kuwaitis?” asked Al-Oda, who added that he hasn’t heard from his son in three months, while other families are complaining that their letters are not reaching the detainees.

Scores of Kuwaitis trained or fought in Afghanistan and Al-Qaeda’s spokesman, Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, was Kuwaiti until the government stripped him of his nationality following the New York and Washington attacks.

But the families of the 12 detained Kuwaitis say their sons and husbands were in Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan to perform charity work and not fight with Al-Qaeda or the Taleban.

Mothers and wives of the detainees are scheduled to meet with a political officer at the US Embassy in Kuwait early September in search of information and, Al-Oda says, to urge the official to “convey a message to his government that there is discontent among the families of the prisoners and many Kuwaitis.”