US has released a Kenyan man who’d been held at Guantanamo for 17 years without charge, as rights groups and others push the Biden administration to end the detention of more than a dozen other men held there without charge, and amid uncertainty over the incoming Trump administration’s plans for Guantanamo.
On Tuesday, U.S. authorities repatriated a Kenyan man, Mohammed Abdul Malik Bajabu, after 17 years at Guantanamo without charge.
His release leaves 15 other never-charged men awaiting release. The U.S. says it is searching for suitable countries willing to take them. Many are from Yemen, a country split by war and dominated by an Iranian-allied militant group.
The U.S. has also transferred two Malaysian detainees at the Guantanamo Bay U.S. military prison to their home country, after they pleaded guilty to charges related to deadly 2002 bombings in Bali and agreed to testify against the alleged ringleader of that and other attacks, the Pentagon said Wednesday.
Prosecutors say Mohammed Farik bin Amin and Mohammed Nazir bin Lep worked for years with Encep Nurjaman, known as Hambali, an Indonesian leader of al-Qaida affiliate Jemaah Islamiya. That includes helping Nurjaman escape capture after Oct. 12, 2002 bombings that killed 202 people at two night spots in Bali, U.S. officials said.
The two men entered guilty pleas to conspiracy and other charges in January. Their transfer comes after they provided testimony that prosecutors plan to use in the future against Nurjaman, the alleged mastermind, the Pentagon said in a statement.
At peak, Guantanamo detained hundreds of men, most Muslim, in the U.S. military’s “war on terror” after the Sept. 11 attacks.
Amnesty International urged President Joe Biden to end the detention of those never-charged men before he leaves office. If not, the rights group said in a statement, “he will continue to bear responsibility for the abhorrent practice of indefinite detention without charge or trial by the U.S. government.”
