U.S. releases 2 prisoners from Guantánamo, leaving 27 still held at American camp in Cuba
The Pentagon freed two prisoners Wednesday from Guantánamo Bay, marking the second and third releases this week from the notorious wartime detention camp.
Mohammed Farik bin Amin and Mohammed Nazir bin Lep were repatriated to Malaysia, where both are nationals, according to the United States Department of Defense. The men had been held by the U.S. since 2003 and imprisoned at Guantánamo Bay since 2006, for their ties to al Qaeda and an Indonesian extremist group called Jemaah Islamiyah.
The repatriation of Amin and Lep came as part of a plea deal and an agreement with the government of Malaysia, Defense officials said. Each pleaded guilty before a U.S. military commission to various war crimes, including murder, intentionally causing serious bodily injury, conspiracy and destruction of property. They also provided deposition testimony that can be used against a different prisoner, Encep Nurjaman, who is believed to be the “mastermind” responsible for al Qaeda attacks in Bali and Jakarta between 2002 and 2003.
Their conditions for release from Guantánamo Bay call for an additional five-year period of confinement for each prisoner, to be served either in the country where they are repatriated or a third-party sovereign nation.
Amin and Lep’s releases were announced one day after the Pentagon said another prisoner, Mohammed Abdul Malik Bajabu, was freed from incarceration at Guantánamo Bay and repatriated to Kenya. Detained by the U.S. for 18 years without criminal charges, Bajabu was the first prisoner freed from the camp in roughly a year. U.S. defense officials said a review board determined in December 2021 that detaining Bajabu “was no longer necessary to protect against a continuing significant threat to the national security of the United States.” The board recommended with that determination that Bajabu be transferred out of Guantánamo Bay.
“The United States appreciates the support to ongoing U.S. efforts toward a deliberate and thorough process focused on responsibly reducing the detainee population and ultimately closing the Guantanamo Bay facility,” the Defense Department said in statements on the releases of all three prisoners.
The latest repatriation efforts leave 27 prisoners still detained at Guantánamo Bay. Of them, 15 are eligible for transfer, three are eligible for evaluation by the review board, and seven are being tried through the military commissions process. Only the final two prisoners have been convicted and sentenced by military commissions, according to the Pentagon.
