Judge questions continued detention of Gitmo Uighurs cleared for release News
Judge questions continued detention of Gitmo Uighurs cleared for release

[JURIST] A federal judge met with Justice Department lawyer Terry Henry Thursday to discuss why the US has not yet released two Chinese Uighur Muslims still held at the Guantanamo Bay prison camp [JURIST news archive] after the government determined they posed no threat to the US as enemy combatants [JURIST report]. Henry met with US District Judge James Robertson [official profile] in a closed-door meeting to explain the steps the US is taking to find a country for the men to enter, since they fear persecution if returned to China. Their lawyer is requesting that they be released temporarily to live with a US resident who has agreed to house them. The Chinese nationals were captured from Pakistan in 2001 as they fled from a Taliban military training camp. Read Judge Robertson's order [PDF] from last week regarding the men's status. AP has more.

THIS DAY @ LAW

UN General Assembly approves Palestine partition plan

The UN General Assembly approved UN Resolution Resolution 181 (II) on November 29, 1947, recommending that the British Mandate for Palestine be split into a Jewish state, an Arab state, and an international zone for Jerusalem. The vote in the assembly was 33 for to 13 against, with 10 abstentions. The resolution sparked a war between Palestinian Arabs and Jews in 1947 and a wider war after Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Iraq, and Lebanon invaded the new State of Israel in 1948. Read Resolution 181 (II).

UN divided Palestine between Arabs and Jews

On November 29, 1947, the UN General Assembly voted to partition Palestine into Jewish and Arab territories, leading to the establishment of a Jewish state the following year. Read UN General Assembly Resolution 181.

Defense Secretary Robert McNamara resigns during Vietnam Conflict

On November 29, 1967, Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara announced that he was resigning from his office to accept an appointment as head of the World Bank. The announcement came as the Vietnam Conflict was becoming increasingly unpopular in the United States and abroad.