Yemeni activists protest guantanamo detentions

Yemeni activists staged a protest outside the US embassy in Sanaa on Saturday against the continued detention of scores of Yemenis in the notorious Guantanamo Bay. "The US treats Yemeni detainees in the worst way," the mother of Abdel-Rahman al-Shabati, who is being held at Guantanamo, told Anadolu Agency. She accused the Yemeni government of neglecting the case of the detainees, accusing Washington of committing a "major human rights violation" by keeping the detainees behind bars without trial. There are 94 Yemenis in the Guantanamo detention camp, where a total of 160 people are detained. Though 58 detainees have been cleared by a US military panel in 2006 and 2008, US authorities have not set them free. The legal assistance group Hood, which organized Saturday's protest, said that the 12th anniversary of the Guantanamo camp, which happens to be Saturday, brings to the memory the years-long suffering of detainees held in the camp. In a statement, the NGO vowed to lobby for the release of the Guantanamo detainees and "to be compensated for the horrible injustice done to them".