More problems continue for the Uighur prisoners in Guantanamao; now, however, some of the prisoners are declaring their reluctance to move to Palau:
Several Guantanamo detainees from western China are uninterested in moving to Palau, the country that agreed to resettle them after their upcoming release, because it is located too close to their homeland, the top Palauan presidential spokesman said Monday… Palau sent a fact-finding team to the Guantanamo Bay detention centre last weekend to assess their needs. But five of the 13 Uighurs declined to meet with the delegation out of concerns that it could not protect them from the Chinese, said Ngiraibelas Tmetuchl, special assistant to President Johnson Toribiong…”They are concerned about security,” Tmetuchl said. “They asked, ‘How are you going to defend us from China?”‘
Palau does not have diplomatic relations with China and instead has developed strong ties with Taiwan, which China claims as its own territory. The U.S. is responsible for Palau’s security.
See also past CDT posts on the Uighurs.
