The US has transferred two brothers from its Guantánamo Bay detention centre to Pakistan, bringing the total number of people held at Guantánamo down to 32, according to the Pentagon.
Abdul Rabbani and Mohammed Rabbani were arrested in 2002. Abdul Rabbani was an al-Qaida facilitator while Mohammed Rabbani was a financial and travel facilitator for prominent al-Qaida leaders, according to the Pentagon’s website.
“The United States appreciates the willingness of the government of Pakistan and other partners to support ongoing US efforts focused on responsibly reducing the detainee population and ultimately closing the Guantánamo Bay facility,” a Pentagon statement said.
Guantánamo started being used by President George W Bush in 2002 to house foreign terrorism suspects following the 2001 hijacked plane attacks on New York and the Pentagon that killed about 3,000 people.
It came to symbolise the excesses of the US “war on terror” because of harsh interrogation methods that critics have said amounted to torture.
There were 40 detainees when Joe Biden, a Democrat, became president in 2021. Biden has said he hopes to close the facility. The federal government is barred by law from transferring Guantánamo detainees to US mainland prisons.
A total of 32 detainees remained, of whom 18 were eligible for transfer, the Pentagon statement said.