What could possibly go wrong? Well, a 2013 study found that 29% of released Gitmo detainees had returned to jihad. Among the Taliban leaders who triumphantly entered Kabul in August 2021 was at least one former Gitmo inmate. Will Majid Khan return to jihad? Why not? It’s what he knows. Of course he may choose a different path, but Biden’s handlers are releasing him without the slightest concern for the safety or well-being of Americans.
“In rare move, U.S. releases ‘high-value’ Guantánamo Bay prisoner,” by Missy Ryan, Washington Post, February 2, 2023:
A former al-Qaeda courier who endured dehumanizing treatment at CIA black sites before spending more than 15 years in Guantánamo Bay was released in Belize on Thursday, a milestone in President Biden’s push to close the high-profile prison but one that underscores he difficulties he will face in doing so.
The resettlement of Majid Khan, who struck a plea deal with U.S. prosecutors in 2012, represented the first time that one of the “high-value” prisoners sent from the secret CIA facilities to the military facility in Cuba in 2006 was freed, his attorneys said.
The nearly year-long delay in releasing Khan, whose 10-year sentence concluded in March, is evidence of the legal and political challenges that Biden must navigate in attempting to finally shut down the facility, which now holds 34 detainees but remains a potent symbol of American excesses in the wake of 9/11.
Free after two decades, Khan apologized for his past. The former Baltimore-area resident pleaded guilty a decade ago to taking part in al-Qaeda plots and later provided testimony in other terrorism cases.
“I have been given a second chance in life and I intend to make the most of it,” he said in a statement released by his attorneys at the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and Jenner & Block.
The release caps a saga that began in 2003 when Khan, who was born in Saudi Arabia but later emigrated with his family to Maryland, was captured in Pakistan. He then endured beatings, sleep deprivation and other forms of torture at the hands of CIA interrogators at secret overseas prisons before being sent to Guantánamo.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Khan had honored his cooperation commitment. “We remain dedicated to a deliberate and thorough process, focused on responsibly reducing the detainee population,” she told reporters Thursday….
