The United States has transferred 12 prisoners from the Guantanamo Bay detention centre to Afghanistan, Yemen and the Somaliland region, justice officials said Sunday, dpa reported.
The prisoners were the latest of the 560 detainees held at Guantanamo on terrorist suspicions who have been transferred to other countries. About 200 remain at the controversial facility which US President Barack Obama had pledged to shut down by January 22 - a deadline he has conceded will not be met.
The 12 recent transfers included: four transferred to the government of Afghanistan (Abdul Hafiz, Sharifullah, Mohamed Rahim and Mohammed Hashim); two sent to the regional authorities in Somaliland (Mohammed Soliman Barre and Ismael Arale); and six sent back to Yemen (Jamal Muhammad Alawi Mari, Farouq Ali Ahmed, Ayman Saeed Abdullah Batarfi, Muhammaed Yasir Ahmed Taher, Fayad Yahya Ahmed al Rami and Riyad Atiq Ali Abdu al Haf.)
Yemen has said it is working to have approximately 100 of its nationals freed from Guantanamo and returned home. They make up nearly half of the population of the prison on the US naval installation in Cuba.
On Tuesday, the White House said it planned to send an unspecified number of Guantanamo detainees to a prison in Illinois as part of the plan to shutter the facility.
Obama has ordered the federal government to buy a state prison in Illinois that would house a "limited number" of detainees.
Officials told reporters that detainees who have been identified as transferable to other countries will remain at Guantanamo until host nations can be found. Defence Secretary Robert Gates earlier this month said there are 116 in that category.
Detainees who face trial in federal courts will be locked up in those jurisdictions, while military commissions for trying suspects will be moved to Thomson along with those charged. Other prisoners who cannot be tried or released to other countries will end up at Thomson as well, a senior administration official said.
Twelve Guantanamo prisoners returned to home countries
