The Canadian government balked at several requests from Washington to provide asylum to men cleared for release from the U.S. military prison in Guantanamo Bay, say newly released documents.

U.S. troops walk on a road as the sun rises over the razor-wired detention compound at Guantanamo Bay.
(Brennan Linsley/Associated Press)

The material, obtained by the Canadian Press under the Access to Information Act, indicates the U.S. administration asked Canada to accept detainees of Uighur descent from China's Xinjiang region who were deemed to be no threat to national security.

The U.S. was not prepared to resettle the men in its own territory, but could not send them back to China for fear they would face persecution.

Today, 17 of the men are still being held and live in isolation for 22 hours a day.

American officials travelled to Ottawa on three separate occasions in late 2005 to press their case with the Liberal government of the time, but to no avail. By May 2006, Washington had succeeded in persuading Albania to take five men, who now live in squalid conditions.

A week after the transfer to Albania, the Americans were back in Canada again, this time meeting with political aides and bureaucrats from several departments and Prime Minister's Stephen Harper's office.

But under the Canada-U.S. Safe Third Country Agreement, refugees cannot make claims to enter Canada from the United States except under a few specific exceptions, such as fear they would face the death penalty in America.

Notes prepared for Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay in February this year suggest the government was still uncertain about whether it had the appetite for any future transfers.

"There has been no final decision by the government of Canada as to whether to formally discourage or encourage the U.S. from making formal referrals for resettlement. [Foreign Affairs] will need to consider the bilateral and multilateral implications."