4 prisoners at Guantanamo returned to Afghanistan

Four terror suspects flew home to Afghanistan after a decade at the Guantanamo Bay prison, the Pentagon said Saturday.

Shawali Khan, Khi Ali Gul, Abdul Ghani and Mohammed Zahir were rounded up after the 2001 US invasion of Afghanistan for suspected ties to the Taliban and its affiliated militant groups.

An interagency board tasked by President Obama to empty and close Gitmo cleared them some four months ago, defense officials said.

Most if not all of these accusations have been discarded and each of these individuals at worst could be described as low-level, if even that, a senior defense source said.

A US military plane flew the men back to Kabul on Friday night.

A total of 132 prisoners remain at the detention center, which Obama has been promising to close since 2009.

Earlier this month, the military set free six low-level prisoners of Middle Eastern origin in Uruguay. In all, 17 Guantanamo prisoners have been transferred since November.

About half the remaining prisoners many have spent a decade or longer at Gitmo are cleared to leave and awaiting transfer.

But political turmoil in the Middle East has disrupted efforts to empty Guantanamo of low-grade terror suspects.

Many of the remaining prisoners come from Yemen, where revolution and upheaval in recent years have made it impossible to return detainees.

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4 prisoners at Guantanamo returned to Afghanistan

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