Montevideo, Mar 23 (EFE).– Uruguayan Foreign Minister Rodolfo Nin Novoa said Monday that Montevideo absolutely will not accept any more inmates from the U.S. prison at Guantanamo, in contrast to the previous government of Jose Mujica, who took in – as refugees – six Middle Eastern men who had been held at the facility.

In remarks to the press, Nin Novoa addressed the issue in responding to a question about whether the government of Tabare Vazquez, which took power on March 1, plans to comply with one of the recent requests made by the six former prisoners to receive land from the Montevideo authorities on which to build a mosque.

“It is being studied. What is certain is that no more prisoners are going to come from Guantanamo. That is absolute,” he said.

The arrival of the six men – against whom no terrorism or other charges were ever filed and who are considered to be low risk individuals – occurred last Dec. 7 in response to Mujica’s commitment to cooperate with U.S. President Barack Obama in the program to close Guantanamo, a detention center set up to house terrorism suspects on the U.S. base in Cuba.

“We have offered our hospitality to human beings who were suffering … in Guantanamo. The unavoidable reason is humanitarian,” said Mujica two days before the arrival of the refugees – four Syrians, a Tunisian and a Palestinian – a move that was harshly criticized by the political opposition.

Last week, Obama said that he should have closed Guantanamo when he moved into the White House in 2009, when there seemed to be consensus with Republicans regarding its closure.

His administration is working against the clock to close the detention center before his term ends in January 2017, but the process is meeting stiff opposition from Republicans, who wound up with control of both houses of Congress in the midterm elections last November. EFE