MPs sacrificing core Maldivian values for personal political mileage on Gitmo issue: Dr Shaheed
04 Oct 2010, 1:00 PM
Azra Naseem
Political self-interest and false assumptions are behind some MPs’ opposition to the government’s plans to resettle a Guantanamo Bay detainee in the Maldives, Foreign Minister Dr Ahmed Shaheed has said.
Opposition to the plan, Dr Shaheed said, amounts to “a couple of MPs and their sponsored press” who “shot first and asked questions later”. Their objections to the plan, he said, do not reflect “core Maldivian values and are based on false assumptions.”
It is assumed, he said, that “everybody at Guantanamo is a lethal terrorist” and that “this government is going to break laws to accede to the United States’ request”.
Both assumptions are false, he said, and are backed by a third – again false – premise that “whatever Shaheed does, must be attacked”.
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