Yet after more than six years in the Guantanamo Bay prison camp, a group of Chinese detainees is still at the centre of an international mess.

The Australian Government has confirmed it is taking another look at settling some of the 17 Uighurs, who are Muslims from north-western China.

The consideration comes after another appeal, the third, from the United States, but this time directly from the President, Barack Obama.

We have already refused to accept them, twice in fact, after appeals from the former Bush administration. The reasons reportedly were because of pressure from China, which considered the detainees terrorists.

But again, the fate of the detainees has returned to our shores.

Why?

The US is concerned about sending the detainees back to China, for fear they will be tortured or executed. A damning, but perhaps realistic assumption, and one sure to irritate China.

But finding a home for Guantanamo detainees is proving a test of Obama's plans to close the notorious prison within a year and a test of diplomatic relations with China.

The obvious inference is that if Obama accepts the detainees' innocence, then he should also accept responsibility, in a liberal democracy, to give them the same rights as every citizen: freedom.

The appropriate gesture would be to allow them to remain in America.

Foreign Affairs Minister Stephen Smith has said Australia would assess the prisoners individually in accordance with strict immigration and national security requirements. Why the shift?

The possibility of accepting the detainees is at the very least damaging to our own relationship with China. It's a position Prime Minister Kevin Rudd would not welcome.

Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull has been quick to oppose any suggestion they be accepted in Australia because it was ''too risky''.

These detainees were arrested in 2001 by Pakistan authorities when they tried to cross borders allegedly to escape persecution. By 2005, without any military trial, they were deemed non-combatants, guilty of nothing, no threat.

They have remained in limbo ever since.

Human decency suggests they should be treated with consideration ... the question is, by whom?