Sweden denies asylum to former Guantanamo detainee

Adel Abdu Al-Hakim, who belongs to a minority group of Turkic-speaking Chinese Muslims called Uighurs, fled China in 1999 to avoid persecution. He ended up in Pakistan, but was swept up in the U.S. dragnet for terrorists after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and was taken to the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

After he was released in 2006, Al-Hakim went to Albania--the only country that would accept him.

In its ruling, the Swedish Migration Board acknowledged that Al-Hakim could not be sent back to China. But the board said he had no reason to seek refuge from Albania.

His Swedish lawyer, Sten De Geer, said he will appeal. Describing the decision as "an unparalleled scandal," De Geer said Albania will not allow Al-Hakim's wife and children, who are still in China, to join him.

Al-Hakim applied for asylum in Sweden in November, when he visited to attend a human rights conference in Stockholm.

The Swedish decision to deny him asylum could also be a setback for at least 16 other Uighurs who remain at Guantanamo because no country wants to accept them.

Under U.S. law they cannot be sent back to China, where they are likely to face persecution, but human rights activists had hoped a positive decision by Sweden would encourage other European nations to offer them shelter.

Two U.S. lawmakers criticized the White House earlier this month for allowing the Chinese government to interrogate Uighur detainees in Guantanamo Bay and demanded they be freed in the United States.