We might take Gitmo refugees

The Australian government has been approached by the United States to take in former detainees from Guantanamo Bay.:

The Federal Government is preparing to quietly accept detainees, but insisted yesterday there would be no wholesale intake of former terror suspects, as each of up to 250 prisoners would be assessed on an individual basis.

About 60 detainees have been cleared for release by the US, but for security reasons they are unable to be sent to their home nations.

After intense lobbying from the US administration - which is preparing to deliver on the Obama promise to close "Gitmo" - both Australia and the British have begun laying the groundwork to examine accepting detainees.

So just why can’t these people be returned to their home country? Or some other Muslim nation whose culture they should be more familiar with?

Major General John Altenburg warns us:

General Altenburg yesterday said there was a significant degree of reoffending among the detainees who had been released from the Cuban prison.

"About 30 of them have been captured or killed or are known to be back on the battlefield," he said. "These are people who were

released because they thought they weren't dangerous. To me, it's a fair comment to say, 'we don't want these people. Now we've got the burden of watching them and we don't know whether they're dangerous or not'."

I note the United States doesn’t want to take them but Obama still wants to close Guantanamo Bay. I don’t like this at all.