MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

OAS to the rescue of Obama calls on country members to accept Guantanamo detainees

“I request respectfully that those countries that can do so...consider receiving people currently detained in Guantanamo”, said Insulza

The Organization of American States, OAS, Secretary General Jose Miguel Insulza “urged the United States to close the Guantanamo Bay facility without delay and arrange for the trial or release of the detainees” and called on member countries to consider receiving detainees in Guantanamo.

 OAS through the Inter American Commission on Human Rights has followed the Guantanamo base situation and has repeatedly asked for the detainees to be treated in accordance with and regional norms regarding human rights, to which OAS member countries have adhered.

And thus in the framework for the IACHR Resolution from July 2012, “I request respectfully that those countries that can do so, in a manner consistent with their national policies and their internal legal framework, consider receiving people currently detained in Guantanamo, in order to allow them to resume their lives following their prolonged detention”, affirmed Insulza in an official OAS release.

Insulza said that despite the efforts made by the government of US President Barack Obama, “more than half of the prisoners that remain in Guantanamo are in conditions to be freed, but have not been for the lack of a country that will receive them. These are people who have not been judged, nor will they be, for any crime, and the exhaustive evaluations that they have been submitted to by the authorities of the United States have determined that they do not present serious risks to the security of the country, nor to any that receives them.”

The Government of the United States has requested that the countries of the Hemisphere examine the possibility of receiving these people in their territories. Since 2009, 18 countries have hosted a total of 48 detained people, reducing the list to 149. Of this number, 79 are in conditions to be freed, if some country will receive them. A positive response to receive a reduced number of them, who do not present a risk to security, would contribute to significantly reducing this serious humanitarian case in the territory of the Americas.

“I reiterate that I make this request in accord with the position maintained by the IACHR, which has on repeated occasions called for the closure of this detention camp.

Such a closure would also require that the United States process the cases of the other 70 detained people, on which it should take a timely decision”, insisted Insulza.

Finally “I believe that our commitment to the universal cause of human rights does not only call on us to comply with them, but also to consider the possibility of cooperating in their fulfillment when another country of the region requests it”.