Released Guantanamo Inmates Can't Find a Home

ABC News has an exclusive article on some of the Guantanamo Bay accused terrorists who were recently released. Of course, the writer of the article makes a point to affirm these detainees' "innocence." She apparently confuses "innocence" with not having enough evidence to charge or prove guilt. That should not simply infer complete and total "innocence." I guess O.J. Simpson is also "innocent?" Yeah...right.

The article features an interview with Abu Bakkir Qassim, one of the recently released detainees. After it was determined that these men could no longer be held, the U.S. had a hard time finding anyone to take them. U.S. officials would not allow them to enter our country and, being that their former home was China where their religion is falling under major scrutiny now, returning there was not an option. The nation of Albania agreed to take in the detainees.

The interview is actually quite entertaining. Of course, Qassim is bitter and upset that he spent four-and-a-half years in prison for, what they call, no reason, but where does he want to go to live?

Q: If not Albania, where do you want to be?

A: Were hoping that the United States government would recognize the mistake that it has done and accept, allow us to enter the United States. U.S. government captured us, U.S. government incarcerated us, locked us up in prison, and U.S. government said that we were not a threat and should be released.

Uighur-Americans came forward, made an offer to the United States government to accept us into Uighur-American society and community. They even went into the courts and contacted the lawyers and wrote a letter to the U.S. government officials asking them to consider releasing us into the United States. Unfortunately, it did not happen, a rather disappointing decision.

However, other countries such as Canada, Germany, Norway, Turkey would also be good countries for us to settle because of their sizable Uighur populations. Uighur culture is an interdependent culture where we always need to see our friends and sit down and talk with them. And especially in our situation, we need a lot of people around us helping us to forget this bitter life experience that we spent wasted in Guantanamo for the last four-and-a-half years.

What a surprise. Qassim goes on to tell the story on how he came to be in Afghanistan and just happened to learn how to shoot guns:

Q: Did you ever receive anything like weapons training?

I reject the motion that I ever received military training. When I went to Afghanistan, I find that quite compelling to use that opportunity to study the Koran … Uighurs are physically Muslim, but they don't really know how to read [religious texts]. That environment provided me an excellent opportunity, so I spent most of my time reading the Koran, learning Islamic, taking Islam, learning more about Islam.

Afghanistan is a country … where you can see guns everywhere. Out of my curiosity, I learned how to use them. It doesn't mean that I was seeking weapons training. I told the U.S. government that just learning how to use that machine gun does not make me a dangerous person or a person who would attack someone or gets me the title that I received military training.

So in other words, yes, I received weapons training but my lawyers told me to simply admit that, out of simple curiosity, I learned how to shoot a gun.

This interview is another example of the MSM trying to spin a story against the war effort in an attempt to make us the bad guys. The guy was apprehended for a reason. He was a suspected terrorist. I agree we can't simply hold on to them forever but just because there isn't enough evidence to charge does not mean they were "innocent."

Linked to: Basil's Blog