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Slovakia has accepted three ethnic Uighur Chinese prisoners from Guantanamo Bay detention camp, the Slovak interior ministry says.

The three are now in the capital Bratislava, a ministry official said. None of them are terror suspects, the ministry stressed.

Slovakia – a member of the EU and NATO – also accepted three inmates from Guantanamo in 2010.

The US says all the Uighur prisoners have now been released from Guantanamo.

Since 2001 the prison has housed suspects detained by US forces during operations against al-Qaeda and the Taliban.

“As in the case of the first transport, the persons in this transport have never been suspected nor accused of terrorism. The transport is a follow-up to the agreement of 2009 [with the US],” the Slovak ministry statement said.

Slovakia has accepted three ethnic Uighur Chinese prisoners from Guantanamo Bay detention camp

Slovakia has accepted three ethnic Uighur Chinese prisoners from Guantanamo Bay detention camp

A US Department of Defense statement named the latest three Uighurs as Yusef Abbas, Saidullah Khalik and Hajiakbar Abdul Ghuper.

“These three are the last ethnic Uighur Chinese nationals to be transferred,” the statement said, adding that they “are voluntarily resettling in Slovakia”.

“This transfer and resettlement constitutes a significant milestone in our effort to close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay,” the statement said, and it thanked the Slovak government for its “humanitarian gesture”.

The US refuses to repatriate Uighur detainees to China because of the risk that they could be mistreated. China has cracked down hard on Uighur dissidents who oppose rule from Beijing.

The latest release brings down the total of Guantanamo detainees to 155. Many have been held there for more than a decade, and many were cleared for release years ago.

More than 100 inmates went on hunger strike earlier this year.

According to a prisoner list published on WikiLeaks website, 22 Chinese Muslim Uyghurs were imprisoned at Guantanamo by US forces after capture in Afghanistan.

In April 2013, President Barack Obama renewed his call to close the prison, saying “it is inefficient, it hurts us in terms of our international standing”.

Previously six Uighurs have been sent from Guantanamo to the Pacific island nation of Palau, while 11 others have gone to Bermuda, Albania and Switzerland.

The Uighurs are a mainly Muslim, Turkic-speaking minority based in western China’s Xinjiang region.

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At least 16 people have been killed in violence in China’s western region of Xinjiang, a state news portal says.

The incident took place late on Sunday in a village near the city of Kashgar.

The government-run regional news portal said police trying to make arrests were attacked by people armed with explosive devices and knives. Police shot dead 14 people, with two policemen also killed.

Xinjiang, home to the Muslim Uighur minority group, sees sporadic clashes.

Xinjiang, home to the Muslim Uighur minority group, sees sporadic clashes

Xinjiang, home to the Muslim Uighur minority group, sees sporadic clashes

The government traditionally blames extremists for the violence, while Uighur activists point to ethnic tensions and tight Chinese control as triggers for violence.

Verifying reports from the region is difficult because the information flow out of Xinjiang is tightly controlled.

The report, on the official Tianshan news portal, said two people were also arrested.

Last month, state media reported nine civilians and two police were killed in an attack on a police station near Kashgar.

In late October, five people were killed when a car ploughed into a crowd and then burst into flames in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square.

Beijing called the incident a terrorist attack inspired by Xinjiang-linked extremists. Three people who died inside the car were identified by police as Xinjiang Uighurs.

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