The Empty Quarter

Kuwait has been considering setting up a Saudi-styled rehab center – perhaps as part of negotiations with the US. One of those detained in Fawzi al-Awda, whose father, Khalid, has been very politically active on the Guantanamo issue  - setting up the Kuwaiti Family Committee and filing lawsuits.

State doing all for Gitmo four

Published Date: February 21, 2009

KUWAIT: The Kuwaiti government has spared no efforts for releasing the four Kuwaitis still held as terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammad Sabah Al-Salem Al-Sabah said yesterday.He denied accusations that the government has been slack on the issue of the Guantanamo prisoners.

In remarks to journalists during an “open day” held by the Capital Governor Sheikh Ali Al-Jaber Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah at his farm in the border region of Al-Abdali, Sheikh Mohammad said charging the government of not doing enough has become a trend, made even “over climatic changes”. The government has succeeded in releasing eight out of the 12 Kuwaitis held at the US-manned camp, he affirmed.

Kuwaiti officials have been exerting special efforts and holding continuous meetings with US officials to try resolve this issue, Sheikh Mohammad added. Kuwait was the first country that assigned lawyers to defend these detainees, he said, adding that it was also the first to refer to American courts and raise the question through the media, expressing satisfaction at the outcome of ongoing talks with the US administration of Barack Obama on the plight of the inmates.

In response to a question about his upcoming visit to Iraq to declare the formation of a bilateral committee, he indicated that the date for the mission would be set during contacts he has been holding with his Iraqi counterpart, Hoshyar Zebari.

The lawyer of the four Kuwaitis still held as terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay said Thursday there is enough evidence to prove to a US federal court that the men should be freed. David J Cynamon, the lead attorney for the men, said the four are challenging their detention as so-called enemy combatants. He said he expects a federal court in Washington to hear their cases in May or June.

The US Supreme Court last year ruled that the remaining detainees at the prison on the US naval base in Cuba can go to federal court to seek their release from indefinite detention. Cynamon would not discuss the evidence, but he told reporters that he spent a week in Kuwait talking to family members and witnesses and gathering documents. “When we arrived here, we believed we had strong cases for all four of the men,” he said. “And now that we have talked to witnesses and collected documents, we believe our cases are even stronger.

Last month, Obama ordered that Guantanamo Bay be shut down within a year. About 245 detainees remain there, including the four Kuwaitis. Their families insist they were in Afghanistan for charity work, not to fight with the Taleban or against the American forces when they were arrested in 2001. Eight other Kuwaitis have been released from Guantanamo. After they returned home, they were tried and acquitted on terror-related charges. The US military has said that one of the eight carried out a suicide car bomb in Iraq in April.- Agencies