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| A Libyan man raises a victory sign in front of a burning Ansar el-Sharia headquarters |
The US State Department has confirmed that it has been offering bounties of up to $10 million to those who may have information that will lead to the conviction of those responsible in the attacks in Benghazi, which killed the U.S. ambassador to Libya and three other Americans in September 2012.
The information was revealed when Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, and 82 other lawmakers sent a letter of concern to the State Department, questioning whether the department has been using its full capacity to seize those responsible.
In August, charges were filed against Libyan militia leader, Ahmed Khattalah, and a few other unspecified suspects. Until now, no one has been charged.
The rewards had been in place since January, yet only came to public knowledge recently. In response to the question as to why the State Department has not publicized the rewards on the "Rewards for Justice" website as it normally would, the department defended its previous actions, stating:
"Due to security issues and sensitivities surrounding the investigation, the event-specific reward offer has not been publicly advertised on the RFJ website. RFJ tools can be utilized in a variety of ways, without publicizing them on the website."
Frankly, I find the concealment of the reward a little bit questionable. While to some degree, I understand that security is a top priority, the lack of knowledge on the current issues can also lead to suspicion and a spread of misinformation - as seen with Elkana's recent post relating to this topic. Just how far should issues be covered and when should the government allow the media to publicize information? What information should be given attention to?
In August, charges were filed against Libyan militia leader, Ahmed Khattalah, and a few other unspecified suspects. Until now, no one has been charged.
The rewards had been in place since January, yet only came to public knowledge recently. In response to the question as to why the State Department has not publicized the rewards on the "Rewards for Justice" website as it normally would, the department defended its previous actions, stating:
"Due to security issues and sensitivities surrounding the investigation, the event-specific reward offer has not been publicly advertised on the RFJ website. RFJ tools can be utilized in a variety of ways, without publicizing them on the website."
Frankly, I find the concealment of the reward a little bit questionable. While to some degree, I understand that security is a top priority, the lack of knowledge on the current issues can also lead to suspicion and a spread of misinformation - as seen with Elkana's recent post relating to this topic. Just how far should issues be covered and when should the government allow the media to publicize information? What information should be given attention to?
4 comments:
The biggest question I have regarding this information is how keeping a reward secret would be more productive in catching these terrorists than publicizing that reward. The whole purpose of the "Rewards for Justice" website is to make certain rewards known so that people are aware of the incentive they have in giving up certain information. Obviously certain aspects of this case should be kept classified or out of the public's view, but I don't think this applies. Keeping a 10 million dollar reward secretive seems to counterintuitive to me, what do you guys think?
I agree with Joey on this one. It does not make sense to me to keep a reward private. It would be great to catch the people responsible for this attack, but very few people would release information without something in return. I am wondering if they hoped they could catch them without information from the public. I think the idea of misinformation due to keeping the information private is really interesting. I would like to know what exactly the people in charge were thinking when they decided to keep it private. Do they know something we don't? Most likely, but if it is so important as to make this a good decision, I don't know if I would want the public to know. It could cause more harm than good.
Like Joey and Connor said, I don't really understand how having private rewards would encourage the apprehension of those that were involved in the Benghazi attacks. But I think that making secret it makes it kind of seem like something sketchy was going on. Like Connor said "Do they know something we don't?" and that also makes me wonder under what circumstances did the people in charge have to make this reward so secretive. After finding out about these secret rewards months later, it just makes this whole situation seem more suspicious, if that makes sense.
What are normal citizens like us going to do with a 10 million dollar bounty for Benghazi Attackers anyways? I mean I read some of the other comments and all so far have agreed that it seems " counter intuitive" to not make it public. But playing devil's advocate why would we even need to know? It's not like we are in Libya or part of any armed force. Perhaps they did not make it public so that the lead Ahmen Khattalah wouldn't know they were searching for him? Who knows.....
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