Guantanamo prison to stay open at least 25 years — US admiral

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba: Former president Barack Obama had vowed to close the US military-run prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, but now it will stay open for at least 25 years, the officer in charge of the facility said Tuesday.

Rear Admiral John Ring said the prison, which holds several alleged plotters of the 9/11 attacks, is focused on readiness to make ‘sure that the facilities are going to last for 25 years’.

In January, President Donald Trump signed an executive order, reversing his predecessor Obama’s ultimately fruitless 2009 directive to shutter the facility that has drawn global scorn.

Following Trump’s move, “they told us we are going to be here for 25 years or more,” said Ring, Commander of Joint Task Force Guantanamo.

The Pentagon ‘sent us a memo saying plan to be open’ for at least 25 years, Ring said during a visit regularly organised by the US military for journalists, with the aim of showing that prisoners are treated humanely at the American enclave in communist Cuba’s southeast.

In December, the top torture expert at the United Nations said reports from sources indicated at least one inmate was still being tortured at Guantanamo Bay.

Nils Melzer, the UN special rapporteur on torture, said he had received information that torture through noise and vibrations was taking place against Ammar alBaluchi, a suspected 9/11 plotter.

Melzer voiced particular concern about detainees who had been held for long periods of time in almost complete isolation.

Under president George W Bush, the military hastily built the prison camp following the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in late 2001.

Over the years, roughly 780 people have been detained at Guantanamo, mostly for their alleged ties to al- Qaeda and the Taliban. — AFP