The Guantanamo detainee and the minister

Murat Kurnaz (24), a resident of the city of Bremen with a Turkish passport, was clapped innocently in Guantanamo Bay for more than 4 years by the US forces. Although there was no evidence that he was a terrorist, he was kept in Pakistan in November 2001 where the 19-year-old attended an Islamic madrassa since some weeks. From there he was brought to the US exclave in Cuba where he was mistreated and tortured.













Although Kurnaz was proved to be innocent, the German government - in these days the coalition of Socialdemocrats and the Green Party - did not help him. As documents now show, the US seemed to have offered the German government to release Kurnaz and send him back to Germany in October 2002 - but the German authorities refused! Also the Turkish government did not want to take Kurnaz.

The questions are now if the accusations against the German officials are true. Has there really been an official offer to release Kurnaz? And if that is true, what were the arguments of the responsible people? Was it just ignorance? Was it political calculation in any way? The whole thing casts a shadow on the "pacifist" image of the red and green-government (that had lost its pacifism with the war in Yugoslavia before). How does it fit with chancellor Schröder´s "no" to the war in Iraq in summer 2002 and there after? And with the political orientation on human rights?

Did the Germans have to make any compromises to appease the Americans? The ice was thin in the relations between Germany and the USA these days. We had this debate about the acceptance of American military flights over German territory and the secret actions against "terrorists" led by the US in Europe (also in "unwilling" Germany). But in the case of Murat Kurnaz even the US seemed to have made the offer to led him free, so an appeasement is not logical. Did the US demand for any "conditions" for the "deal"?

The focus here is on foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier now who has been the responsible person for the work of the secret services as minister of the chancellery in Schröder´s government. Steinmeier who is the most popular and probably also the most competent politician of the current German government negates any knowledge of an offer by the US in 2002 and calls such accusations against the former government and him "infamous". One had the impression that Steinmeier has lost some of his calmness. He will be heard not until March.

Kurnaz who has been clapped without any accusation was finally released in August 2006 and now lives in Bremen again.