Ms Sandy Hodgkinson
US State Department
Deputy Director for War Crimes

Dear Ms Hodgkinson,

I am writing to you to thank you for your comments on the fate of the released Guantanamo prisoners as reported by the BBC. Your statement that “The US position is clear – we will not send individuals to places where we believe it is more than likely they will be tortured” really tickled me. Honestly, I can say that it was one of the funniest things I had ever read. In fact “HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA” that is brilliant! The US kidnapped these inmates from around the world, in defiance of the public views of every single civilised government in the world, let alone the overwhelming world public opinion opposing extraordinary rendition and the physical and legal treatment of prisoners by the US at Guantanamo Bay. After kidnapping these men & children, denying them any form of modern legal protection, physically and mentally tormenting & torturing them before finally declaring them innocent of your own government’s unfounded charges – you have the gall to whine that the rest of the world is behaving hypocritically by not offering to these men political asylum or pretending that you care that they might be tortured when returned home after you have accused them of terrorism?

For the avoidance of doubt, if your government has any concerns that these innocent men are at risk of ill treatment on return to their own countries then it is TOTALLY the responsibility of the US government to ensure their safety and well being. After all, you kidnapped them. If this involves granting those innocent men and children asylum in the USA then that is what you are morally obliged to do. You are only fooling yourselves with you descriptions of these men as “no longer enemy combatants” when you failed to offer any evidence to anyone that these men were in fact anything other than ordinary. Why has it become Albania’s problem that your intelligence services are consistently incompetent and routinely kidnap innocent people? Could it be because it would be embarrassing to the US government to admit that the vast majority of inmates at Guantanamo, those to whom the former Defence Secretary referred to as “the worst of the worst”, are actually innocent of any and all crimes that the US accuses them of? The world thinks so.

Anyway – please make sure that you are roster’d for future public statements – you are quality entertainment value.

Best Wishes

AJ Bladderwait.