D.J. McGuire of China e-Lobby writes:

Andy, I can only hope you were just trying to make a larger point on UNCAT (a [treaty] I will not defend) rather than actually suggest we should send the 15 Uighurs back to Communist China.
The idea that we should send any opponent of the CCP back to their clutches is [completely] bonkers, and cruel besides. These guys had no intention of coming after us; they only wanted to free their own country from Communist occupation, which given the CCP’s history of supporting international terrorism (Iran, Saddam Hussein, al Qaeda, the Taliban (2nd and 3rd items), etc.), is not something I see as a bad thing.

D.J is right, I was only trying to make the larger point about the box UNCAT puts us in – I don’t pretend to be any kind of expert on the Uighurs. And I did say that what we might consider with UNCAT is an exception that gives us the *right* (which is to say, the option) to send people back to their own countries – not one that would *require* the government to do so. Since the Uighurs are apparently not enemy combatants, I don’t see why the usual rules of asylum wouldn’t apply, not to mention what Derb suggests, which, I think, is finding a country willing to take them and where we have confidence they will not face persecution.