Yemeni surgeon to leave Gitmo

GUANTÁNAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba — The U.S. government Monday agreed to release a Yemeni orthopedic surgeon — who reportedly treated al-Qaida wounded at Tora Bora in Afghanistan — under a new review ordered by President Obama meant to empty the prison camps here by January 2010.

Ayman Batarfi, 38, told a military review panel that he was a humanitarian worker who found himself at the battle of Tora Bora while Osama bin Laden was in the area, according to a Pentagon transcript. He was captured in Afghanistan and sent to the prison camps here in 2002.

Batarfi also told the 2005 review panel that he did not respect bin Laden, whom he described as "a coward" who "left the people behind when he escaped to the mountains."

Batarfi will be sent to "an appropriate destination country in a manner that is consistent with the national-security and foreign-policy interests of the United States," said Justice Department spokesman Dean Boyd in Washington, D.C.

He is the second detainee the administration has ordered released. Ethiopian-born Brit Binyam Mohamed was freed in February.

Clinton: "Global war" not used

THE HAGUE, Netherlands — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton says the Obama administration "has stopped using" the phrase "global war on terror."

Then-President Bush used the phrase as a rallying cry after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.

Clinton spoke as she headed to Europe for a week of diplomatic meetings. The phrase "war on terror" is widely disliked overseas, and was associated with harsh interrogation practices.

"I haven't heard it used. I haven't gotten any directive about using it or not using it, it's just not being used," Clinton said.