Canada & New Zealand Refuse Guantanamo Detainees
NIMBY. Of course. Classic.
AP reports: “New Zealand refused several times to take detainees the U.S. wanted to relocate from its Guantanamo Bay military prison, a senior official said Monday.
“In 2005 and early 2006, New Zealand declined several requests from the United States to resettle Guantanamo Bay detainees as refugees in New Zealand,” the Labor Department’s refugee services director Kevin Third said in a statement.
. . .Earlier this month, The Canadian Press reported that notes prepared for former Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay in February indicate the Bush administration asked Canada to accept Guantanamo Bay detainees of Uighur decent from China’s Xinjiang region who were deemed to be no threat to national security.
Canada balked at the requests to provide asylum, according to the documents.
Not Canada, our freelove socialist neighbors? Anyway, why not simply send these detainees back to their own country of origin?
The U.S. was not prepared to resettle the men in its own territory, but could not send them back to China for fear they would face persecution.
Go figure. But still America gets criticized for being heartless.
The Pentagon has confirmed the U.S. government had talks with other countries over the possible transfer of detainees.
“The government has long stated that we have no desire to be the world’s jailer. To that end, we continue to discuss with other governments the possibility of transferring detainees once humane treatment and continuing threat concerns have been satisfactorily addressed by the receiving country,” Pentagon spokesman Greg Hicks told The Associated Press in an e-mail last week.
It’s far easier for other countries to complain about us. But when it comes time to doing something, they don’t want to be part of it - not in their backyard.
Wonder why outspoken France and Germany haven’t stepped up yet? Perhaps their busy dealing with their existing immigrant refugee mess. Besides, why be nice?
China takes a hard-line on dissidents from its oil-rich Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, also known as East Turkestan.
And yet China’s president doesn’t get burned in effigy, compared to Hitler, and scorned wordwide, on bumper stickers, t-shirts and websites littered with profanities.
Maybe our nation’s president should take notes. As Machiavelli once famously wrote about executive leadership: “Better to be feared than to be loved”
August 20th, 2007 at 10:04 am
We are always the first to be blamed. We are always the first for requested aid somewhere. We are always first in striving for freedom for all. We are first to be the most inhumane to all others. America is first in everything. Eat your heart out Europe, New Zealand, Canada, Mexico and the Middle East. We are the best because we work hard to be the best. Only the ‘ninnies’ cannot survive without ‘birth to death’ care.
August 20th, 2007 at 11:46 am
How about the notion of detaining people on a whim in the first place. Yes it is heartless. If you want to stop terrorism stop the funding. the one thing that hasn’t been done mainly because it is too many of bush and conservative bussiness partners. No better to fly them out of the country. It is easy- their is no terrorism without the banks to move the money around.
August 20th, 2007 at 5:10 pm
Kraig,
There will always be ways of moving money around with or without banks.
But how about flying these pieces of pig dung (specifically-chosen phrase for them) to other countries anyway? If they don’t want them, let them take care of the problem. I’m thinking specifically of sending a bunch to France, a few more to Italy. You know, all the countries that decry our inhumanity so loudly, and have major muslim populations to integrate those hooves of pigs feet back into.
August 21st, 2007 at 1:31 pm
The U.S. may not want to be the world’s jailer, but it’s pretty clear than no one else wants the job.
Not that I blame other countries. It’s much easier, and more popular, to let big, bad America deal with unpleasant realities like terrorism: and then yell at America when things go wrong, or approval ratings at home start slipping.
Cynical? Maybe. But I think that the (rather long) list of countries participating in America’s “unilateral” action in Iraq is suggestive. There are many places out there where people don’t mind having Uncle Sam covering their back.
August 22nd, 2007 at 1:32 pm
I totally agree, and all we need to do is act in a way that puts the world on notice that whatever we do or say in defense of Democracy or freedom anywhere, we mean what we say. We dont have do that heavy handedly either, although a little thump up the side of the head once in while for emphasis wouldnt hurt.
But we cant do that as long as we have weak timid leaders, apothetic citizens, and moral relativism.