Obama Team Clears 75 Detainees For GITMO Release

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An Obama administration task force has so far cleared 75 of the remaining 223 Guantanamo prisoners for release as part of its effort to close the detention camp, a military spokesman said on Monday.

The review team is examining each prisoner's case to decide who will be held for trial and who can be sent home or resettled in other nations. President Barack Obama had set a January 22 deadline to shut the detention camp although Defense Secretary Robert Gates told ABC News in an interview broadcast on Sunday that "it's going to be tough" to meet the deadline.

As the review team makes its decisions, military officials at Guantanamo post an updated list in the camps to let the prisoners know how many from each nation have been judged free to go.

"It was an opportunity to just provide better communication," said Navy Lieutenant Commander Brook DeWalt, a spokesman for the Guantanamo detention operation.

"There's a lot of information out there and you get a lot of things from a lot of different angles. It helps put it in a more succinct context for them."

The prisoners are well aware of Obama's announcement that the camp would be closed and have heard piecemeal information from their lawyers and relatives during phone calls arranged by the International Committee of the Red Cross, he said.

The list is posted in Arabic, Pashto and English. The latest list of 78 prisoners includes two Uzbeks sent to Ireland and a Yemeni returned to his homeland on Saturday, an indication that some progress is being made in thinning the camp population of those who are not considered a threat.

"We are not focused on whether the deadline will or won't be met on a particular day," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said. "We are focused on making ... the most progress that is possible."

Some on the list are among the 30 ordered freed by U.S. courts but still awaiting transfer, including 13 Chinese Uighurs. The Pacific island nation of Palau has agreed to accept most of them.

Also on the list are 26 other captives from Yemen, nine from Tunisia, seven from Algeria, four from Syria, three each from Libya and Saudi Arabia, two each from Uzbekistan, Egypt, the West Bank and Kuwait, and one each from Azerbaijan and Tajikistan.
Most were captured in Afghanistan and Pakistan after U.S. troops invaded Afghanistan in 2001 to oust al Qaeda in response to the September 11 hijacked plane attacks on the United States.

Source: Reuters US Online Report Politics News

Robert Gates And Hillary To GOP Leaders: You’re Putting Our Security At Risk

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Wow. Robert Gates and Hillary Clinton are now thrusting themselves into the raging fight over the White House’s request for Congressional cash for the International Monetary Fund, demanding in a letter that GOP leaders back the funding or put our security at risk.

I’ve obtained a copy of the letter, which was sent to GOP leaders John Boehner and Mitch McConnell and Dem leaders Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, though the obvious targets are the Republicans, who have opposed the IMF funding. Gates and Clinton significantly up the stakes, saying that the IMF funding would reduce the threat of terrorism.

The battle over the IMF funding is at the center of the big battle on Capitol Hill over the war spending bill. House Republicans are strongly opposed to including in the bill the IMF funding, which the White House wants to fulfill a pledge to foreign leaders to fund the IMF to help foreign economies weather the downturn.

In the letter, Gates, Clinton and a third signatory, National Security Adviser James Jones, say the IMF plays a key role in reducing the “security risks” the crisis “poses to our nation and the world.” The crisis, it says, risks destabilizing foreign economies, producing “unforeseeable reactions.”

It adds:Financial hardships and poverty breed desperation, which helps terrorist networks to attract new recruits with messages of hate, violence and intolerance. IMF financing reduces this threat by reducing economic instability in vulnerable states.

Ironically, Boehner and Eric Cantor have justified their opposition to the IMF funding on national security grounds, claiming it could help state sponsors of terror. But that case could be tougher to make, now that Gates, Clinton and Jones say funding the IMF is necessary to reduce the terror threat and enhance our security.