This was one more case of the Obama Administration re-writing (perverting!) refugee law when they declared that Guantanamo Bay prisoners were really “refugees” to be resettled by the South American country of Uruguay. We told you about the outrage here in December (see who in the Obama Administration made the call).
Now, the bloom is off the rose for Uruguay (the ‘refugees’ do not want to work) and the former prisoners expect you, the American taxpayer, to help them out financially.
From AP via USA Today (emphasis is mine):
MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay (AP) — Four freed Guantanamo Bay detainees protested in front of the U.S. Embassy on Friday night, saying they were angry about being asked to leave a Uruguayan hotel that had been housing them and demanding Washington help them financially.
Adel bin Muhammad El Ouerghi said he had been asked to leave the Metro hotel, a budget inn where he and some of the other five former detainees periodically stayed.
The four Syrians, one Tunisian and one Palestinian have been housed in a four-bedroom house in Uruguay’s capital since the government took them in after their release in December. But “we are too many to stay in the house,” said El Ouerghi, who spent much of the last few months at the hotel.
As a humanitarian gesture, the men were invited to resettle in this poor South American country of 3.3 million people by President Jose Mujica, who has since left office.
They allegedly had ties to al-Qaida and spent 12 years in the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. But they were never charged, and the U.S. released them because officials decided they were no longer a threat.
El Ouerghi said the men wanted to speak with the U.S. ambassador to Uruguay. He said the United States should help the men financially, an argument he and a few of the other former detainees have made repeatedly.
Citizens of Uruguay are disgusted!
While the men’s arrival to Uruguay was greeted by fanfare, the smiles and posing for pictures quickly turned to complaints and controversy. By their own admission, they have struggled to adjust, and on several occasions have complained about not getting enough help from Uruguay’s government.
In early February, a controversy erupted when people in Uruguay learned that the men had been offered jobs but did not take them.
Endnote: Uruguay got a lot of publicity last year when the government said it would take in Syrian refugees, but it appears they got the first batch and said no more Muslim men!