China Pressured Costa Rica to Withdraw Asylum Bid

Cu, 01/10/2014 - 10:16 -- Anonymous (doğrulanmamış)
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Photo Courtesy of Andy Worthington from a rally in Washington, DC
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Three Chinese men unlawfully detained by the United States at the controversial Guantanamo Bay detention camp in the island of Cuba were recently cleared for release to the Slovak Republic in Central Europe. At one point, however, these Muslims were ready to start a new life in Costa Rica, at least until the People’s Republic of China (PRC) got in the way.
 
The Obama administration sent three ethnic Uighur Muslim captives from Guantánamo to Slovakia, the Defense Department said Tuesday, ending one of the saddest and longest-running chapters of unlawful detention at the U.S. prison camps in Cuba.
 
The three men were identified as Yusef Abbas, Hajiakbar Abdulghuper and Saidullah Khalik. As with many other operations conducted by the United States, this prisoner transfer was shrouded in secrecy. These men were part of a group of 17 Uighurs, members of an ethnic and religious minority in China. The Uighurs are also considered to be separatists by the PRC.
 
Ms. Rosenberg explains how Costa Rica was ready to take in these three detainees, who were never actually charged with any crime but yet were deprived of their freedom for more than a decade by the U.S.:
 
The last three Uighurs at Guantánamo packed their bags to leave Camp Iguana for the second time this year. In September, the men had been offered and accepted resettlement in Costa Rica, according to two U.S. government officials who spoke about the deal anonymously because they were not authorized by the Obama administration to discuss it.
 
They were ready to go when the Costa Rican government suddenly withdrew the offer, said one official who called the Uighur captives of Guantánamo “extraordinarily difficult to resettle, in particular because of Chinese pressure” on countries that might have otherwise taken them in.
 
In late 2008, Ms. Rosenberg wrote about the conditions that the Uighurs were subjected to in Guantanamo:
 
For years, the men were kept like any other enemy combatants here — in austere, chilly steel-and-cement cells copied from a Michigan prison. Days revolved around one recreation period, three meals delivered to each man’s solo cell, and the echo of others’ prayers through the walls.
 
Thanks to pressure from human rights organizations and to the excellent work of journalists such as Ms. Rosenberg, conditions would later improve:
 
Now they pray together, eat together and kick a soccer ball around a dirt patch at Camp Iguana, a prime piece of prison real estate on a cliff overlooking the ocean.
 
Uighurville ”is a significant improvement,” said lawyer Seema Saifee, one of several attorneys who shuttle to meet the men and noted they have “greater mobility and access to fresh air and sunlight.”
 
They asked for a live sheep recently to celebrate Islam’s holy Eid al Adha, the Feast of the Sacrifice, and were rebuffed […]
 
Costa Rica gets close to 100 asylum requests per month. Asylum seekers, particularly those fleeing from totalitarian and militaristic regimes, are enticed by the prospect of refuge in a peaceful and democratic country without an army. More than 12,000 refugees currently live in the country, but as discussed by the Costa Rica Star in 2013 with regard to the unlikelihood of offering asylum to whistleblower Edward Snowden, current political leaders are showing their vulnerability to international political pressure.
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