US ready to release 100 Guantanamo detainees: diplomat

0 Comments | AFP, April, 2006

PARIS (AFP) — The United States is ready to release some 100 detainees from its base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, once their home countries or a third party agree to take them in, a senior US official said.

"Around 100 prisoners at Guantanamo are ready to leave, once their home countries are ready to receive them," State Department official Sandra Hodgkinson told reporters at the US embassy in Paris.

"It takes time to secure an agreement from their countries of origin: we want assurances that they will be treated humanely and also that they will be kept under watch," said Hodgkinson, the deputy head of the State Department's war crimes office.

"Where do they go when they are released? In the case of Afghans, for example, do they go back to Afghanistan? But...