It’s a sign that the sands are shifting when the Daily Mail picks up a cause, as it recently did in joining the sudden media chorus on the long-standing story of Shaker Aamer. A British citizen, Shakur has been in Guantánamo Bay for 12 years after being arrested in Afghanistan. He has never been charged by the US with any crime, and has never been brought to trial. He was cleared to leave Guantánamo in 2007 by the Bush administration and again in 2009 by the Obama administration, yet still he remains detained in the prison.
His acerbic interpretation of the UN Declaration of Human Rights is a potent postcard from the War on Terror>>>
The timing of the UK media push on Shaker is interesting and unlikely to be random. The Senate report revealing previously undisclosed CIA torture has just been made public and the British authorities are scrambling to distance themselves from suggestions that they were party to, or aware of, what was (is?) occurring in the name of fighting terrorism. Useful to have a counterpoint story of an innocent Brit wronged by the system. You could call it smokescreen tactics… But in all likelihood, if the UK government had really wanted Shaker Aamer freed, it would have happened a long time ago.
Would love to know how these state-to-media conversations operate…
Some updates on this here http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jan/16/shaker-aamer-guantanamo-bay-prioritise-obama-case