Two more Gitmo detainees make their case for release

January 05, 2005

By Paisley Dodds
Associated Press

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL STATION, Cuba — A prisoner with alleged links to Afghanistan’s ousted Taliban regime appeared before a review tribunal Tuesday in Guantanamo, saying he traveled from Kazakhstan to study and had been in Afghanistan for five days when he was taken captive.
Wearing a black skull cap and speaking through a Russian interpreter, the 24-year-old said he went to Pakistan to find a religious school but while on break, he went to Afghanistan where he was taken by Afghan forces in August 2001 and turned over to U.S. forces in December.

The U.S. government says he stayed in house in Afghanistan with two others who worked as cooks for the Taliban, an allegation he denied during questioning by the three-member tribunal.

“I have only one question,” said the man, when asked by the review tribunal president if he would like to ask the panel any questions. “When are you going to release me?”

The man was an Uighur, one of some 22 being held at the U.S. prison camp in Guantanamo Bay, and part of an ethnic Muslim minority. This man came from Kazakhstan, which used to be part of the Soviet Union and where they could not practice their religion freely.
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