London, UK, December 19 2007 – The release of three British residents from the US gulag at Guantanamo Bay is hopefully welcome news for the families of those who have been held and brutalised for more than four-and-a-half years. However, it remains to be seen whether or not they become a political football within Europe as the Spanish have belatedly applied for their extradition. Their detention on arrival back in the UK adds to their ordeal and it seems that people are guilty until proven innocent.

Their release does nothing to detract from the continued detention of hundreds, the deaths of several detainees in unexplained circumstances and the continued policies of ‘extraordinary rendition’ and ‘secret prisons’.

Commenting on the release, Dr Imran Waheed, media representative of Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain, said, "In the past six years the world has witnessed hundreds of thousands killed in two brutal occupations, torture at Bagram, Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, indefinite detention at Guantanamo and the UK’s own Guantanamo at Long Lartin prison and the outsourcing of torture through ‘extraordinary detention’ – all of this from the US and Britain who although claiming to be the standard bearers of freedom and democracy are willing to abandon all principles under the pretext of the ‘war on terror’."

"It is clear that when it comes to the interests of Western governments everything is allowed – support for dictators, secret detention, incarceration without trial, extraordinary rendition and torture. Putin, the Israeli regime and every dictator in the Muslim world are more than happy to take their lead from London and Washington. Freedom, democracy and ‘human rights’ are merely slogans that are quickly discarded to suit the political interests of the powerful."

"Those commentators and politicians, who unashamedly support a colonialist, interventionist foreign policy in the Muslim world and dishonestly label Islam as medieval and inhumane, should turn their attentions to the oppression that is meted out in the name of freedom, democracy, liberal values and the ‘war on terror’."

"The Islamic Caliphate is the only viable alternative to the turbulence and instability that colonialism has wreaked on the world – it will abolish all torture, ensure that citizens are innocent until proven guilty, prevent the state from spying on citizens and will never abandon the rule of law for political interests or materialistic gain."

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