FORTUNATELY, NO ONE TOOK THEM SERIOUSLY TO BEGIN WITH:

Berlin Imposes Tough Conditions for Guantanamo Inmates: Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier wants Germany to take in former Guantanamo inmates who cannot be sent home. The country's Interior Ministry, however, is setting an impossibly high bar for accepting detainees that could exclude most of the prisoners expected to be released. (Der Spiegel, 2/16/09)

[T]he German government plans to set such tough conditions for taking in detainees that it will be almost impossible for a prisoner to fulfill them, SPIEGEL has learned.

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier and Interior Minister Wolfgang Schäuble, who have previously crossed swords over accepting detainees, have agreed that each case must be individually examined to determine whether the prisoner poses a danger to German society. However the Interior Ministry is insisting that only people who have a connection to Germany be taken -- which would rule out almost all the inmates expected to be released from the camp.

In addition, the Interior Ministry wants the US administration to explain why a detainee poses no danger in Germany, even though he can neither return to his homeland nor be kept in the US. The bar would be raised so high on the conditions that it would hardly be possible for an inmate to fulfill them.

Europeans don't help us to defend them, just whine about the way we do it.

Posted by Orrin Judd at February 16, 2009 8:11 AM