A Guantanamo Bay prisoner is being transferred to France
As soon as he moved into the White House, Barack Obama vowed to close down the infamous prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, within one year. The challenge: what to do with the 200 or so “enemy combatants” still locked inside? Some, like the 9/11 plotters, are admitted terrorists who will likely never see the other side of a jail cell. But many others are either peripheral figures in the war on terror or completely innocent. Obama has been aggressively reaching out to ally countries in the hopes of finding new homes for the less-dangerous detainees, but the offers have been slow in coming. This morning, however, French president Nicolas Sarkozy agreed to help. “Proud and happy” that Obama is closing the facility, Sarkozy promised to accept one prisoner, reportedly an Algerian with connections to France. “We can’t condemn the United States because they have that camp and then wash our hands of it once they close it,” he said. “That’s not what being allies is about.” Your move, Stephen Harper.