This is Seriously Weird

Benjamin Wittes
Saturday, July 19, 2014, 7:10 PM
Russia slaps a travel ban on Rep. Jim Moran, Judge Gladys Kessler, and a bunch of people connected to Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib. That'll show 'emFrom the Associated Press:

MOSCOW (AP) — Russia has placed a U.S. lawmaker and 12 other people connected with the Guantanamo Bay detention camp and the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq on its list of those banned from entering the country.

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Russia slaps a travel ban on Rep. Jim Moran, Judge Gladys Kessler, and a bunch of people connected to Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib. That'll show 'emFrom the Associated Press:

MOSCOW (AP) — Russia has placed a U.S. lawmaker and 12 other people connected with the Guantanamo Bay detention camp and the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq on its list of those banned from entering the country.

In a statement Saturday, Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said congressman Jim Moran, a Democrat from Virginia, was banned in response to the July 2 U.S. ban on Russian parliament member Adam Delimkhanov. He said Moran had been repeatedly accused of financial misdeeds but didn't elaborate.

The other 12, including Guantanamo commander Rear Adm. Richard Butler and Lynndie England, a former soldier convicted of abusing prisoners in Abu Ghraib, were banned in response to the United States' adding 12 names in May to the so-called Magnitsky List of Russians sanctioned for human rights abuses.

Retired Brig. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, who commanded U.S. ground forces in Iraq in 2003-2004, retired Col. Janis Karpinsky whose command included the Abu Ghraib prison, and Gladys Kessler, a federal judge who rejected a Guantanamo inmate's complaint of being force-fed while on hunger strike, were also included.


Benjamin Wittes is editor in chief of Lawfare and a Senior Fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution. He is the author of several books.

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