Pentagon broke law with POW-Taliban prisoner swap: GAO

The Pentagon violated US law when it controversially swapped a soldier held in captivity for five years in Afghanistan for five Taliban detainees without giving lawmakers sufficient notice, congressional investigators found Thursday. The Pentagon used $988,400 of its wartime funding for the transfer that freed Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl. The Government Accountability Office said President Barack Obama's administration violated a section of the Department of Defense Appropriations Act for 2014, which bars the agency from using federal funds to transfer any Guantanamo detainees without giving key committees in Congress at least 30 days' notice.’In addition,’ the GAO said in its finding, ‘because DoD used appropriated funds to carry out the transfer when no money was available for that purpose, DoD violated the Antideficiency Act,’ which prohibits federal agencies from spending funds not expressly appropriated for the purpose. With the 2014 law, Obama gained some flexibility in transferring prisoners from the US detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. But he was still required to notify Congress 30 days in advance, according to AFP.