Trump to keep Guantanamo Bay open for the ‘bad dudes’

Donald Trump has signed a new executive order announcing his intent to keep the US military prison open.

US military guards walk within Camp Delta military-run prison, at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba. Picture: AP

Donald Trump has signed an executive order ­announcing his intent to keep the US military prison at Guan­tanamo Bay open, marking a formal reversal of predecessor’s Barack Obama’s eight-year effort to shut it down.

Mr Trump made it clear during his 2016 campaign for president that he wanted to keep Guan­tanamo open and “load it up with some bad dudes”, but he has not yet sent a new detainee to the facility or transferred any out.

The order, which he signed just before delivering his first State of the Union address, says the US maintains the option to detain additional enemy combatants at the detention centre in Cuba, when lawful and necessary to ­protect US national security.

It requires the defence ­secretary to recommend criteria for determining the fate of individuals captured by the US in armed conflict, including sending them to Guantanamo Bay.

“Terrorists who do things like place bombs in civilian hospitals are evil,” Mr Trump told the joint sitting of congress.

“When possible, we have no choice but to annihilate them. When necessary, we must be able to detain and question them. But we must be clear: Terrorists are not merely criminals. They are unlawful enemy combatants.

“In the past, we have foolishly released hundreds and hundreds of dangerous terrorists only to meet them again on the battlefield, including the ISIS leader, al-­Baghdadi, who we captured, who we had, who we released.” He was referring to Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

The office of the Director of National Intelligence said in its most recent report on the subject that about 17 per cent of the 728 ­detainees who have been released from Guantanamo are ­“confirmed” and 12 per cent are “suspected” of re-engaging in militant activities.

But the vast majority of those re-engagements occurred with former prisoners who did not go through the security review that was set up under Mr Obama. Mr Trump’s order says this review process would continue to be used to determine whether detainees should be held.

Practically, not much is expected to change, said Lee Wolosky, who was Mr Obama’s special envoy at the State Department for closing Guantanamo.

“I don’t think signing a new executive order changes very much,” Mr Wolosky said. “But as a symbolic matter, it changes a great deal because the two presidents before him were trying to close Guantanamo because they recognised that it was a detriment to our national security. Symbolically, it reaffirms his interest in perpetrating a symbol that has greatly damaged the United States.”

It is unclear if Mr Trump’s order will prompt much reaction overseas since foreign leaders already knew that he wanted to keep it open. European allies, Muslim leaders and other critics have been vehemently opposed to how detainees have been held at Guantanamo for decades without charge.

“I have no doubt terrorist groups like ISIS will applaud Trump’s announcement that it is now the formal policy of the ­United States to detain Muslims forever without charge in an offshore prison,” said lawyer J. Wells Dixon of the New York-based Centre for Constitutional Rights.

Mr Dixon said militants would continue to use it to recruit members. “Keeping Guantanamo open is politically expedient but exceedingly stupid no matter how you look at it,” he said.

The centre, which president George W. Bush opened in January 2002 to hold and ­interrogate suspected enemy combatants, reached a maximum population of about 680 in 2003. Mr Bush transferred about 500 out before he left office. Mr Obama transferred 197 detainees out, leaving 41, including five cleared for release.

Mr Trump also asked congress to make sure that in the fight against the ISIS and al-Qa’ida, the US had necessary power to detain terror suspects “wherever we chase them down, wherever we find them”. That was an apparent reference to war powers written years ago that some argue do not cover the fight against ISIS.

AP