China Demands Return of Gitmo Detainees

[leftchick]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060509/ap_on_re_as/china_guantanamo_detainees

BEIJING - China on Tuesday demanded the return of five Chinese Muslims released from the Guantanamo Bay detention center, denouncing a U.S. decision to allow them to seek asylum in Albania.

The United States allowed the five Chinese to go to the Balkan country after concluding they posed no terrorist threat to the United States but might face persecution if they returned to China.

"These suspects should be sent to China as soon as possible," said Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao.

"The act by the United States and Albania strongly violates international law," Liu said at a news briefing.

Liu claimed that the five Chinese, members of the country's Uighur minority, are suspected of being members of a group accused of waging a violent separatist campaign in the country's northwest.