Charles Levinson and David Rohde, Special Report: Pentagon thwarts Obama’s effort to close Guantanamo. Reuters, 28 December 2015. “In September, U.S. State Department officials invited a foreign delegation to the Guantanamo Bay detention center to persuade the group to take detainee Tariq Ba Odah to their country. If they succeeded, the transfer would mark a small step toward realizing President Barack Obama’s goal of closing the prison before he leaves office.
The foreign officials told the administration they would first need to review Ba Odah’s medical records, according to U.S. officials with knowledge of the episode. The Yemeni has been on a hunger strike for seven years, dropping to 74 pounds from 148, and the foreign officials wanted to make sure they could care for him.
For the next six weeks, Pentagon officials declined to release the records, citing patient privacy concerns, according to the U.S. officials. The delegation, from a country administration officials declined to identify, canceled its visit. After the administration promised to deliver the records, the delegation traveled to Guantanamo and appeared set to take the prisoner off U.S. hands, the officials said. The Pentagon again withheld Ba Odah’s full medical file.”
Today, nearly 14 years since he was placed in the prison and five years since he was cleared for release by U.S. military, intelligence and diplomatic officials, Ba Odah remains in Guantanamo.
In interviews with multiple current and former administration officials involved in the effort to close Guantanamo, Reuters found that the struggle over Ba Odah’s medical records was part of a pattern. Since Obama took office in 2009, these people said, Pentagon officials have been throwing up bureaucratic obstacles to thwart the president’s plan to close Guantanamo….
To slow prisoner transfers, Pentagon officials have refused to provide photographs, complete medical records and other basic documentation to foreign governments willing to take detainees, administration officials said. They have made it increasingly difficult for foreign delegations to visit Guantanamo, limited the time foreign officials can interview detainees and barred delegations from spending the night at Guantanamo.…
When Obama took office, the prison held 242 detainees, down from a peak of about 680 in 2003. Today, with little more than a year remaining in his presidency, it still holds 107 detainees.…
The Pentagon’s slow pace in approving transfers was a factor in President Obama’s decision to remove [Chuck] Hagel [as Secretary of Defense] in February [2015], former administration officials said. And in September, amid continuing Pentagon delays, President Obama upbraided Defense Secretary Ashton Carter in a one-on-one meeting, according to administration officials briefed on the encounter.
Since then, the Pentagon has been more cooperative. Administration officials said they expect to begin transferring at least 17 detainees to foreign countries in January.
Military officials, however, continue to make transfers more difficult and protracted than necessary, administration officials said….
Even if Obama manages to transfer all low-risk detainees to other countries, closing Guantanamo won’t be easy. Several dozen prisoners considered too dangerous to release would have to be imprisoned in the U.S., a step Republicans in Congress adamantly oppose because, they say, it would endanger American lives.
In a press conference earlier this month, Obama said he still hoped to strike a deal with Congress. He added, however, that he reserved the right to move the prisoners to the U.S. under his executive authority.
The Bush administration faced no political opposition on transfers and was able to move 532 detainees out of Guantanamo over six years, 35 percent of whom returned to the fight, according to U.S. intelligence estimates. The Obama administration has been able to transfer 131 detainees over seven years, 10 percent of whom have returned to the fight.
“Groundbreaking” Exposé Shows Pentagon Thwarting Obama’s Bid to Transfer Guantánamo Prisoners. Democracy Now!, 30 December 2015. “In the nearly seven years since President Obama ordered Guantánamo’s closure, Republicans have blocked him at every turn. Now a new report sheds light on another obstacle in Obama’s way: his own Pentagon. According to Reuters, military brass have imposed bureaucratic hurdles to keep prisoners locked up and prevent foreign governments from taking them in. Scores of prisoners cleared for release have remained imprisoned for years as a result. We are joined by two guests: Charles Levinson, the Reuters reporter who broke this story, and Omar Farah, the lawyer for a Yemeni prisoner who was cleared for release five years ago but remains behind bars due to Pentagon interference.”