Obama Mulls Transferring Gitmo Detainees to Afghanistan

Move Aimed at Restarting Negotiations With Taliban

New reports from the Associated Press say that the Obama Administration is considering a plan to send a number of detainees from Guantanamo Bay to Bagram prison inside Afghanistan, with the hope that the move would kickstart stalled talks with the Taliban.

Previous talk of releasing detainees in return for talks seem to have been abandoned, and instead officials are now saying that a transfer to a Karzai-run prison, nominally outside of direct US control, would be enough to show interest in talks.

US talks with the Taliban ended before they’d really started in earnest, with the insurgents announcing in the wake of the Kandahar Massacre that they could no longer justify talking with the “erratic” US in the face of public outrage against them.

The pared back offer of Bagram instead of house arrest is mostly a function of the Obama Administration wanting to look tougher on terror, and to avoid criticism from Republicans in Congress, who blasted the old plan. In the end it seems unlikely it will accomplish anything, however.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.