WASHINGTON (AFP) — Two lawmakers with President Barack Obama's Democratic Party appealed to let Uighurs locked up at Guantanamo Bay move to the United States, saying they were victims of injustice.
The plea came despite an overwhelming Senate vote a day earlier to block money to transfer inmates out of the deeply controversial "war on terror" prison in Cuba, which Obama on Thursday vowed again to shut down.
US authorities four years ago cleared 17 imprisoned Uighurs -- members of a largely Muslim group in northwestern China who the State Department says face worsening persecution by Beijing.
But they are stuck at Guantanamo Bay due to fears that Beijing would torture them if they return. The United States has asked Germany, home to a large Uighur community, to take them in.
"We cannot expect the world to miraculously resolve this problem of our own making," Congressman Jim McGovern said.
"It is not enough, quite frankly, to ask that they be placed in Germany or in some other European country. I believe that we have an obligation to resettle at least some of the Uighurs here in the United States."
