German head attacks Guantanamo(closed down)

[cal04]

GERMAN Chancellor Angela Merkel has criticised the US detention camp at Guantanamo Bay, days before she is due to meet US President George W Bush. "An institution such as Guantanamo cannot and should not continue to exist like that in the long term," she told the weekly magazine Der Spiegel, implicitly calling for it to be closed down.

The interview will be published on Monday.
"Different means of behaving with the prisoners have to be found," she said, adding that she would raise the issue with Bush when she sees him in Washington on Friday.

Among those held at Guantanamo is Murat Kurnaz, 23, a German of Turkish origin, detained without charge for the four years. He is nicknamed "the Bremen taliban" from the city in northern Germany where he was born.


It will be Merkel's first visit to Washington since she became chancellor in November. Under her predecessor Gerhard Schroeder relations between the two countries became chilly, largely because of his opposition to the war in Iraq. Merkel hopes to improve them.


http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,17759933%255E1702,00.html

[OKNancy]

1. kick

[sabra]

2. Germany‘s Merkel says Guantanamo should be shut

http://www.heraldnewsdaily.com/stories/news-00121554.html

Germany‘s Merkel says Guantanamo should be shut

BERLIN - German Chancellor Angela Merkel, in an interview published days before her first visit to the United States, said Washington should close its Guantanamo Bay prison camp and find other ways of dealing with terror suspects.

"An institution like Guantanamo can and should not exist in the longer term," Merkel said in an interview with the weekly magazine Der Spiegel published on Saturday. "Different ways and means must be found for dealing with these prisoners."

Merkel has vowed to repair ties with the United States, severely strained over the U.S.-led Iraq invasion, which her predecessor Gerhard Schroeder strongly opposed.

But there was no sign she would hesitate to speak out on issues where disagreement exists. Asked about her comments at a news conference later in the day, she said: "That‘s my opinion and my view and I‘ll say it elsewhere just as I have expressed it here."

[Charlie Brown]

5. It's good to know there are still some decent conservatives in the Worldnt

[Auntie Bush]

3. Good for her! Doubt she'll improve relations with truth &f rank talk.

[Olney Blue]

4. Gutsy move by Merkel. The chimp doesn't like criticism.

[unkachuck]

6. shades of raygun....

...."Mr. Bush, tear down this detention camp!"....