Guantánamo's Uyghurs to Go to Palau, not Munich

The news from Palau has come as a total surprise – also to Dolkun Isa in Munich, the Secretary General of the World Uyghur Congress: "It is of course very good news, because all the countries always refused to accept Uyghurs."

But Dolkun Isa is also disappointed. Munich’s more than 500 Uyghurs and some local politicians had campaigned for the Guantánamo Uyghurs to come to Germany.

"The people living in Guantánamo for seven years have psychological problems because of seven years in jail," he says. "Maybe they were tortured. If they come to Germany, we are ready to give moral support to them. We have some small companies, some small Uyghur businesses, which are prepared to provide jobs to them. So they would very quickly be integrated in the German society."

Objections in Germany

But there was resistance in Germany as well. Interior minister Wolfgang Schäuble, in particular, insisted that the United States had set up the Guantánamo camp in the first place, so the US should now also bear the consequences. Reed Brody from Human Rights Watch in Brussels thinks another factor might have discouraged German politicians.

"Apparently, the Chinese government considers these Uyghurs, who come from a part of China that is chafing under Chinese rule, to be potential terrorists, and has threatened and put pressure on countries like Germany," says Brody.

Palau feels honoured

Palau doesn’t have these problems, being one of a handful of countries worldwide which don’t recognize Beijing, but have diplomatic relations with Taiwan instead. Palau’s president Johnson Toribiong said in a statement he was "honoured and proud that the United States had asked Palau to assist in such a critical task".

Reed Brody from Human Rights Watch puts it this way: "Palau is a country that has very strong ties to the United States. It was United States’ possession for a long time and certainly is a country that is susceptible to American pressure if there is one."

Brody doesn’t think sending the Uyghurs to Palau is the best solution: "The Uyghurs are probably the easiest of the Guantánamo detainees to resettle. They are people who almost certainly were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Even the Bush administration said they have no links to terrorist activities. One would think we could have done better and that Palau might be saved for the hard cases."

The Albanian example

In the past, Albania has accepted a few Uyghurs released from Guantánamo. The exile community in Germany and other places has helped them settle down, and now they are doing reasonably well, says Dolkun Isa from the World Uyghur Congress:

"They are very popular through the media, so all the Albanian people know them. Those people also integrated very quickly into the Albanian society. Some of them go to the university now, some of them work in Albania."

But at least there are some cultural similarities in Albania: most people are Muslims, as are the Uyghurs. The last census from Palau doesn’t mention Muslims among the 20,000 inhabitants. The Uyghurs are from a desert area which is further away from the nearest ocean than any other place on earth. They are now likely to find themselves in a divers’ paradise 800 kilometres east of the Philippines.

Author: Thomas Bärthlein
Editor: Grahame Lucas