Detainees Depart GTMO for Resettlement; MCOP Observer Present- Hattie Harman

Breaking in the media today was news of the release and transfer abroad of five long-term Guantanamo Bay detainees.  Five Yemeni detainees deemed of low threat to the U.S. were released last night and accepted today for resettlement in Georgia and Slovakia.  The Department of Defense confirmed the transfer Thursday afternoon, and Carol Rosenberg of the Miami Herald was following the story as it broke.  And without realizing at the time what I was observing, I watched last night around 8:00 p.m. as a plane departed Guantanamo Bay Naval Station, apparently carrying the transferees.  As the NGOs sat around the tents last night discussing yesterday’s observations, the sound of an aircraft departing disturbed our conversation and we all looked up into the night sky.  Not accustomed to observing nighttime plane departures at Guantanamo, one of the group remarked, “I wonder who is on that plane.”  Now we know.

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