Update on Uighurs
on May 7, 2006 at 10:28 pm
Lawyers for Chinese nationals who have been held at the U.S. military prison camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, have raised new questions about the status of nine captives, five of whom apparently have been sent to Albania where they reportedly have applied for asylum. The D.C. Circuit Court has given those attorneys ten days to file a status report, and, in the meantime, has cancelled a hearing that had been scheduled for Monday on the merits of the prisioners’ continued detention.
Two of these individuals were involved in an unsuccessful attempt to persuade the Supreme Court to step in, ahead of any ruling by the Circuit Court, to rule on the legality of the detention of the members of a persecuted Muslim minority, the Uighurs, after the U.S. military had decided they were not “enemy combatants.” The Supreme Court denied that request for review on April 17, leaving the case to the Circuit Court for the time being.
On Friday, the Justice Department filed an emergency motion to dismiss the case as moot, saying that the two Uighurs had been accepted by Albania, and U.S. officials said they were satisfied they would be treated humanely there, and would not be returned to China, where they might face torture.
The Circuit Court asked for a response from the prisoners’ lawyers by noon Saturday. In their reply, the attorneys said they had not been able to confirm any of the information the government had supplied. They said they had “no prior knowledge of the reported transfer” of the two Uighurs who had been involved in the pending case, or of three others who reportedly also have been sent to Albania. The statement of the Albanian government about the arrival of five Uighurs can be found here.
Besides those five, attorneys told the Circuit Court that there are four other Uighurs who have been at Guantanamo, in the same circumstance. Their fate, too, appeared to be uncertain.
In view of the developments, the Circuit Court was asked to delay Monday’s scheduled argument, and give the attorneys ten days to provide a status report. One of the attorneys was arranging to travel to Albania. Counsel were notified by the Court on Sunday that the request had been granted, and that the Court would decide, after the status report is filed, what to do next, possibly including the filing of new briefs.
It is unclear whether the Circuit Court had been given any notice of the government’s intention to transfer the Uighurs to Albania while their case remained pending in that Court. The government’s Friday motion read as if that was the first word the Court had been given on the sudden developments.
