One in seven freed GITMO detainees have returned to terrorism: Pentagon report

Washington, May 21 (ANI): About one in seven of the 534 prisoners released from the Guantanamo Bay dentition center in Cuba, has returned to terrorism or militant activity, an unreleased Pentagon report has claimed.

This conclusion could strengthen critics' arguments against the transfer or release of any more detainees as part of President Obama's plan to shut down the facility.

Past Pentagon reports on Guantanamo recidivism have been met with skepticism from civil liberties groups and criticized for their lack of detail.

The Pentagon promised in January that the latest report would be released soon, but Bryan Whitman, a Pentagon spokesman, said this week that the findings were still "under review."

Pentagon officials said there had been no pressure from the Obama White House to suppress the report about the Guantanamo detainees who had been transferred abroad under the Bush administration.

The report is the subject of numerous Freedom of Information Act requests from news media organizations, and Whitman said he expected it to be released shortly.

The report, a copy of which was made available to The New York Times, says the Pentagon believes that 74 prisoners released from Guantanamo have returned to terrorism or militant activity, making for a recidivism rate of nearly 14 percent.

Among the 74 former prisoners that the report says are again engaged in terrorism, 29 have been identified by name by the Pentagon, including 16 named for the first time in the report. The Pentagon has said that the remaining 45 could not be named because of national security and intelligence-gathering concerns.

Terrorism experts said a 14 percent recidivism rate was far lower than the rate for prisoners in the United States, which, they said, can run as high as 68 percent three years after release. ANI)