Update Feb. 4th: More on Gitmo guys going to Canada here.
The National Post of Canada reports:
Six Guantanamo Bay detainees, backed by Canadian sponsors, are seeking refugee status in Canada with the pending closure of the U.S. detention centre in Cuba, including three Chinese Muslims who have been cleared of posing a threat to American security.
The Chinese Muslims are Uighurs, whom we have posted on several times before. They are graduates of al-Qaeda training camps, but have been characterized by human rights groups as Chinese dissidents who accidentally got caught up in our war. Strangely, although they have been cleared by a court of being a terrorist threat, and ordered released, no country has been willing to take them. Until, possibly, now.
Mehmet Tohti of the Uyghur Canadian Society said that Canada came close to accepting Guantanamo Uyghurs in 2006, but backed off for fear of reprisal from China at a time when Canadian officials were trying to negotiate with authorities over the fate of Huseyin Celil, a Canadian citizen and ethnic Uyghur being held in China on terrorism charges.
Canada’s efforts failed and Celil was sentenced to life imprisonment in 2007.
Mr. Tohti said that bid to bring the detainees to Canada has been revived, in part, because there is a feeling that Canada has nothing to lose now that it has been snubbed by Beijing in the Celil appeal.
Not only that, but Canada could score points with President Obama by taking detainees.
Moreover, permitting them to come to Canada would send a signal of Canada’s willingness to co-operate with the Obama administration, which is seeking countries to accept Guantanamo detainees in light of the planned closure, Mr. Tohti said.
U.S. President Barack Obama told NBC News Monday that closure of the Guantanamo prison was a matter of upholding U.S. values and law, and that a failure to do so would ultimately make Americans less secure.
I’ve wondered and wondered what Obama means by that statement. All I can think of is Alinsky’s guideline to confuse people. Freeing terrorists make us more secure. War is peace. Lies are truth.
And who are the three other terrorist who are not Uighurs? Just garden-variety Saudis or Yemenis? Can we start building a fence along our northern border too?