Monday - July 03, 2006

From Gitmo To French Prison

All I’ve got to say is it’s too bad the Frogs closed down Devil’s Island. It could come in pretty useful right about now. But don’t kid yourselves, kiddies. My money says the Frogs either let these creeps go or they get a slap on the wrist (one year in prison) and then set free. After all, Chirac must keep to pattern and bend over and kiss the Muslim’s behinds - as usual ...

Six Ex-Guantanamo Inmates on Trial in France
_{July 3, 2006, 1:29 PM EDT}

PARIS (AP) - Six Frenchmen freed after years in the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, prison went on trial in a Paris court Monday on charges of links to terrorism. The suspects were detained by U.S. forces in or near Afghanistan after the U.S.-led invasion to depose the Taliban government in late 2001. Prosecutors began the trial by recounting modern Afghan history and briefly questioning the defendants.

Former detainee Imad Kanouni told the court he traveled to Afghanistan in 2001 to pursue religious education because it was a popular destination for such voyages at the time. But “I was ready to die for a good cause, defend people who were attacked in their countries,” he said, insisting that he didn’t agree with the ideas of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and never visited al-Qaida military training camps.

The trial is expected to run two weeks. The men, who spent between two and three years at Guantanamo, face up to 10 years in prison if convicted of “criminal association with a terrorist enterprise.” The seven French citizens held at Guantanamo all were released in 2004 or 2005 and delivered to French authorities.

One was freed immediately with no charges filed, after French judicial officials said he had no link to Islamic extremism. Five were released but put under investigation and are now on trial. A sixth currently on trial was never freed. Most defendants were expected to plead not guilty. Kanouni’s lawyer, Felix de Bellay, called the trial “intellectually as well as legally shocking.”

Another defendant, Khaled ben Mustafa, told the court that he had been “sold” to U.S. forces in December 2001 by Pakistani villagers after he fled Afghanistan. Defendant Nizar Sassi told the newspaper 20 Minutes that he hoped the charges would be dropped—“to give a strong response to what is happening at Guantanamo.”

He called the base “a machine to create hate for the United States, to produce savage beasts,” and accused prison authorities of physical and psychological torture, the newspaper reported Monday.

Posted by The Skipper     on 07/03/2006 at 02:03 PM   
Filed Under: • Terrorists •  
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It's been a long strange trip without you Skipper, but thanks for pointing us in the right direction and giving us a swift kick in the behind to get us going. Keep lookin' down on us, will ya? Thanks.

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