Security Analyst refutes claims Gitmo detainees are innocent

Source: George Nyavor | Myjoyonline.com | george.nyavor@myjoyonline.com

Security Expert, Dr Kwesi Aning, wants claims by the two former Guantanamo Bay detainees that they are not a part or against any terrorist group to be taken with a pinch of salt.

The Director of the Faculty of Academic Affairs and Research at the Kofi Annan Peace Keeping Centre says the claims by the two detainees during an interview on Accra-based Uniq FM Monday could be a ruse.

"The nature of terrorist recruitment strategies and the brainwashing that takes place means that these guys are highly-trained operatives, they know how to tell stories that seem convincing and they will continue to do what they've done," Dr Aning told Joy News' Kwabena Owusu-Ampratwum.

The two former terror suspects, Mahmud Umar Muhammad Bin Atef and Khalid Muhammad Salih Al-Dhuby said they are grateful to President John Mahama for providing them a new home in Ghana and have reolved to lead peaceful lives.

They say they are innocent people who were unjustifiably detained by the United States government for 14 years.

They insist they are not a threat to Ghana.

"We are not a part or against any group like Al qaeda or other things. We  do not belong to any part of them.

"We are here and want to live a normal life. We have been wrongly arrested for 14 years without any charge against us.

"We want to live in Ghana quietly and peacefully. We are happy for the warm reception accorded to us," one of the detainees said during the interview.

The Uniq FM interview is seen by many as a strategy to quell public fear of a possible terror attack  as Ghana accepts the detainees from the US government.

However, Dr Aning thinks the interview on Monday evening was unnecessary and a deception.

"If the US, with all its enhanced interrogation techniques could not break these people down and they now have the perception that these people are safe, I am worried and disturbed that we are giving such  platform to these individuals to try and convince a nation of 24 million people that they are peaceful," he stated.

Dr Aning cited a US Department of Defence report in 2009 that described Mahmud Umar Muhammad Bin Atef as posing a high risk to the United States, its interest and allies to drum home his point that the two detainees pose a threat to the country's security.

"They [the US] are telling us seven years down the line that their assessment has changed. That raises even more questions.

"If those assessments are now perceived to be wrong,  what assessments were made in terms of the way in which their supporters and those groups that they belong to will react to their being brought to Ghana. What will be the perception of Islamic State in West Africa, that is the previous Boko Haram and Al qaeda " he demanded.