French nationals found among US prisoners: Saudi Arabia wants to question nationals
PARIS, Jan 28: Police confirmed on Monday that a number of French citizens were among the 158 Al-Qaeda and Taliban prisoners held in a US naval base in Cuba.
The detainees, reportedly born in France to immigrant parents, could further complicate matters for Washington, which has been criticized for its treatment of the captives held at the Guantanamo base.
“There are some French, or some French-X (French with double nationality), but we don’t know how many. The numbers we have in our possession fluctuate too much,” a police officer said.
French foreign ministry spokesman Francois Rivasseau said officials were trying to verify information reported by the newspaper Le Figaro that seven detainees being held in cages on the base were French citizens, born in France to immigrant parents.
He said the US government had confirmed the presence of several French-speaking men among the prisoners.
The development seems likely to fuel the international criticism levelled at Washington for its treatment of combatants captured in Afghanistan.
Apart from France, British media are focusing on at least three Britons said by relatives to be held in the cages at the camp, while Saudi Interior Minister Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz told the Al-Watan newspaper that his country was “following up” with Washington the fate of an unspecified number of Saudis that are in Guantanamo.
US authorities, who have temporarily suspended further prisoner transfers from Afghanistan, have said the current 158 captives are of 25 different nationalities, but have refused to give further details.
An outcry has gone up in several countries around the world over Washington’s initial handling of the prisoners, who were flown in from Afghanistan wearing black-out goggles and ear defenders, in shackles and shorn of their beards and hair.
They are being held in wire-fence cages measuring 2.5 metres by 2.5 metres in Camp X-Ray, which the United States rents under a 1934 treaty with Cuba.
The United States has also come under fire from key allies — notably France and Germany — for insisting the detainees, even the Taliban soldiers, are “unlawful combatants” rather than prisoners of war, limiting their protection under the Geneva Conventions.
That opens the way for them to be tried by secret military tribunals decreed by US President George W. Bush and maybe executed.
The presence of foreigners among the prisoners may complicate matters for the United States, especially if it is confirmed several come from Western nations that are allied with it in its “war on terror”.
US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who visited Camp X-Ray on Sunday, reiterated that the captives were “terrorists” who did not deserve prisoner-of-war status.
The foreign ministry said the Red Cross, which has visited the prisoners, had alerted Paris to the presence of French-speaking men, according to Rivasseau.
But, he added, “we still aren’t certain about the existence, number and identity” of French prisoners until ministry officials verifying the information reported back.
News of the French prisoners drew a sharp response from far-right politician Bruno Megret who said their detention showed that immigrants posed a threat to France.
Megret asked that the government strip them of their French nationality and make no effort to spare them from US justice.
SAUDI ARABIA: A Saudi official said in remarks published on Monday that his country wants to interrogate its nationals, arrested in Afghanistan by the United States and sent to a military base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
The Saudi newspaper Al Watan quoted Saudi Minister of Interior Prince Nayef bin Abdelaziz as saying his country was following up with the US authorities on Saudi detainees at Guantanamo Bay.
He hoped that there would be cooperation with the US officials in this matter and said that as soon as the Saudi authorities receive the detainees it will interrogate them and will not only rely on the interrogation made by the US officials.
The US authorities are detaining 158 people belonging to the Al Qaeda organization and the ousted Afghani Taliban militia at the Guantanamo Bay naval base.—dpa/AFP
