It has never been a criminal offence for UK citizens to visit Afghanistan. It was a country, after all, that the USA had given $43 million dollars too as a reward for its role in the War on Drugs. So bear in mind that -
a) not all Britons detained were in Afghanistan.
b) it is not a crime to be in a country that America invades.
dailykos.com/story/2004/9/28/1012/80773
I think it’s really important to remind people that one of the first things the Bush administration did when it got into office was to give the Taliban $43 million in aid. In other words: Bush only has $2 million to spare today for Haitians who are dying of cholera and dysentery a short flight off the Florida coast, but he had $43 million to spare 4 years ago for people who were harboring Osama bin Laden and keeping girls out of school.
UPDATE: It looks as if the Karl Rove commentary machine went into action to blast the Scheer editorial. Sending food aid through the UN is better than sending cash directly to the Taliban, but, in this case, I believe that the Taliban were so repressive that even funneling food aid through the UN amounted to indirect aid to the Taliban. Also: what audit trail or other evidence do we have that the United States actually ended up sending food aid through the UN rather than sending cash to the warlords? And how much of the food aid did the warlords steal and sell for cash? It looks as if some
Afghan Americans have doubts about what happened to the pre-9/11 food aid.
Faustian Deal With the Taliban
By Robert Scheer
Published May 22, 2001 in the Los Angeles Times
Enslave your girls and women, harbor anti-U.S. errorists, destroy every vestige of civilization in your homeland, and the Bush administration will embrace you.
All that matters is that you line up as an ally in the drug war, the only international cause that this nation still takes seriously.
That’s the message sent with the recent gift of $43 million to the Taliban rulers of Afghanistan, the most virulent anti-American violators of human rights in the world today.
The gift, announced last Thursday by Secretary of State Colin Powell, in addition to other recent aid, makes the U.S. the main sponsor of the Taliban and rewards that “rogue regime” for declaring that opium growing is against the will of God. …
Never mind that Osama bin Laden still operates the leading anti-American terror operation from his base in Afghanistan, from which, among other crimes, he launched two bloody attacks on American
embassies in Africa in 1998.
Sadly, the Bush administration is cozying up to the Taliban regime at a time when the United Nations, at U.S. insistence, imposes sanctions
on Afghanistan because the Kabul government will not turn over Bin Laden. "
