Guantanamo | Democrat-elected officials have called on Joe Biden to close the prison

As 20^E On the anniversary of the September 11 attacks, 75 delegates elected to the House of Representatives demanded in an open letter to the President the high cost of this controversial detention center.

“There are 800 inmates at Guantanamo Bay, but now there are only 39 men, many of whom are elderly and frail,” they stressed in the letter.

“According to press reports, the prison costs more than $ 500 million a year, which is about $ 13 million a year in prison,” they said.

Elected officials noted that 20 years later it is still not closed, “tarnishing our reputation abroad and undermining our ability to uphold human rights and the rule of law.”

The Guantanamo Bay prison was opened in early 2002 to detain al-Qaeda members and accomplices of the perpetrators of the September 11, 2001 attacks.

“We recognize that it will take time to close the prison, but we think it’s time for you to make decisions,” the elected Democrats wrote to Joe Biden.

They are proposing that some prisoners be tried by federal courts, while others be deported to their home country and finally sent to third countries to ensure that they are treated well and that they are not represented. To the United States.

Many of the Guantanamo detainees have been detained despite evidence of their involvement. Many were tortured on secret CIA sites before being transferred to Guantanamo.

Barack Obama ordered the prison to be closed in January 2009, when he came to power, with the idea of ​​prosecuting prisoners through civil courts. But the decision was not very popular and was blocked in Congress.

Mr. Obama wanted to wisely release the hundreds of prisoners approved by the Presidency Review Committee. The release was interrupted during the Donald Trump administration. They reopened under Joe Biden after gaining the approval of five inmates since January.

Twelve Guantanamo detainees, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, are awaiting trial by a military commission that has issued only two indictments in two decades.