GUANTANAMO BAY, Cuba, Oct. 5 (UPI) -- Many of the 550 detainees held at the U.S. prison in Guantanamo Bay in Cuba will be released to their home countries, the Financial Times reported Tuesday.
Brig. Gen. Martin Lucenti, deputy commander of the joint task force that controls the base, told the newspaper he expects most will be freed or extradited to 42 different countries where they were captured as suspected members of al-Qaida or the Taliban.
Fifteen of the prisoners face tribunals, as ordered by the U.S. Supreme Court, to decide whether they were correctly designated as "enemy combatants." Since early 2002, about 200 captives have been released.
"Most of these guys weren't fighting -- they were running," Lucenti said. "Even if somebody has been found to be an enemy combatant, many of them will be released because they will be of low intelligence value and low threat status."
The human rights group Amnesty International said Tuesday Lucenti's statement is an admission that the imprisonment of the detainees was illegal.
"This is explicit acknowledgement that these detentions without charge or trial were wrong from the start," said Amnesty. "The question remains whether the United States will admit to its mistake and promptly end this injustice."
