WASHINGTON, Oct. 28 (UPI) -- The U.S. State Department will not return Uighur detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to China even though some European nation have rejected them.
The Financial Times reported Thursday the United States failed to persuade Germany, Switzerland, Finland and Norway to accept the two dozen detainees who, according to the Defense Department, do not pose a threat to U.S. or allied interests. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said Washington was still talking to countries about their resettlement, but refused to say which ones.
The Uighurs, Muslims from China's Xinjiang province who have been held at the U.S. naval base in Guantanamo Bay, were captured as part of the U.S.-led war on terrorism. China regards them as terrorists, but Washington has refused to send them home because of human rights concerns.
Boucher said the detainees don't want to return to China, adding, "We're certainly not in a position to say that they wouldn't be tortured or hurt."
The issue came up in talks Thursday between U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell and Gen. Liang Guanglie, chief of the General Staff, of China's People's Liberation Army, he said.
