Now that the White House has agreed to close down its infamous Guantanamo Bay terror penitentiary as to avoid the wrath of human rights organization and the ever increasing burden such a facility is having on its budget, US officials have been in talks with Yemeni officials to arrange for the establishment of a detention/rehabilitation centre near the capital, Sana’a.
US President Obama reiterated his plan this week to oversee the permanent closure of Guantanamo. US officials in Washington confirmed that the Pentagon is definitely looking at all options. "There's a definite recognition that this needs to happen but if it's not done right, the risks are very high," said a U.S. official familiar with the talks.
With more than half of Gitmo’s 164 detainees being Yemenis, the establishment of a Yemeni-based terror penitentiary has been floated by both US and Yemeni officials as the next logical step.
As with everything in Yemen, it is funding which has been at the heart of the terror debate, this and the fear that Yemen will not provide a safe enough environment on its home soil to contain the threat that is al-Qaeda. Yemen al-Qaeda has long been labelled by Washington as the most dangerous and potent terror branch in the region and US officials essentially fear that upon their release, all former Gitmo prisoners will resume their terror activities by joining up AQAP and disappear from Yemen’s radar.
While both governments agree that Yemen prisoners cannot be kept in judicial limbo ad vitam eternam (many detainees have actually been cleared for release and all charges against them dropped), Washington is uncomfortable letting them go.
The US does not want to be seen as releasing into the wild potential threats to its national security and Yemen officials fear being perceived as persecutors to their people. Activists have actively campaigned for the release of all Yemeni Gitmo prisoners, arguing that since all charges had been dropped neither the US nor Yemen for that matter could legally justify their ongoing incarceration or stigmatization.
Rights activists have already warned they would not tolerate the establishment of a new Guantanamo. "I don't think [it] should exist unless it's an actual rehabilitation program," said Andrea Prasow, senior counter-terrorism counsel with Human Rights Watch. "There's no way I would find it acceptable for [returned Yemeni detainees] to be held against their will."
With a fine line to be walked in between issues of national security and legal matters, Yemen and the US have yet to define a willing formula to their terror dilemma.