3 Detainees At Guantanamo Are Released To Albania

Three detainees at the Guantanamo Bay prison for terrorism suspects have been released to Albania, months after authorities determined they were no longer "enemy combatants," officials said yesterday.

The State Department announced that the Albanian government agreed to accept an Algerian national, an Egyptian national and an ethnic Uzbek who was born in the former Soviet Union. Their names were not released.

The three were the last of 38 detainees to be released after a U.S. combatant-status review determined that they were no longer enemy combatants. It took months for the State Department to find countries that would accept the former terrorism suspects, and in the meantime they were held separately at one of six camps at the Guantanamo Bay compound. That camp will be closed, Pentagon officials said.

"The United States has done the utmost to ensure that these three detainees will be treated humanely upon release," the Pentagon said in a news release. "Our key objective has been to resettle these detainees in an environment that will permit them to rebuild their lives. Albania will provide this opportunity."

There are still about 430 detainees at Guantanamo Bay, the Pentagon said. Some have been held since the detention center opened in January 2002.

According to the Pentagon's count, since 2002, approximately 345 detainees have left Guantanamo for other countries.