There’s something painfully familiar about US tactics in Guantanamo

IRELAND has agreed to take two of the prisoners from the American concentration camp at Guantanamo, Cuba because they cannot go back to their home country, Uzbekistan. The Americans would like us to think they have jailed only crazed Muslim terrorists in Guantanamo, but people should ask who were held there.

One of those held for the past six years was Mohammed Jawad, who is currently believed to be 19-years-old. He was just 12-years-old when he was arrested in Afghanistan in December 2002 for allegedly throwing a hand grenade at a vehicle occupied by two American soldiers and their Afghan translator.

The Afghans arrested him later and he supposedly confessed under torture. He was then handed over to the Americans at Bagram airfield, the main American military installation in Afghanistan. He reportedly confessed again there and was transferred to Guantanamo.