THE BURNED OVER DISTRICT

Now there are five less residents at the Guantanamo Bay resort facility for unlucky Muslims. Two Tunisians and three Yemenis have been resettled in Kazakhstan.

Their transfer followed a recently renewed pledge by President Barack Obama for a stepped-up push to shut the internationally condemned detention center, where most prisoners have been held without being charged or tried.

The prisoners — two from Tunisia and three from Yemen — had been cleared for release from the prison by a government task force, but could not be sent to their homelands. The U.S. has sent hundreds of prisoners from Guantánamo to third countries. But this is the first time Kazakhstan has accepted non-Kazakh detainees for resettlement. The oil-rich, Muslim majority nation accepted a Kazakh detainee in Oct. 2008 and three others in Dec. 2006.

Kazakhstan’s acceptance of the five followed extensive negotiations. Though Kazakhstan is a key ally of Russia and China, it has cultivated areas of economic and diplomatic cooperation with the West.

Kazakhstan is looking to maintain good relations with all big powers, according to Richard Weitz, a senior fellow at the Washington D.C.-based think tank Hudson Institute.

“They have a multi-vector diplomacy,” Weitz said. Kazakhstan, likely concerned that with the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, worries the U.S might lose interest in Central Asia and "is striving to keep the U.S. engaged in the region,” Weitz added.

The prisoners’ release brings the prison population at Guantánamo to 127, according to a Pentagon statement. More than half are of Yemeni origin.

The U.S. government has moved 28 prisoners out of the prison this year — the largest number since 2009 — and a senior U.S. official said the quickened pace would continue with further transfers expected in the coming weeks. On December 7, the U.S. resettled six Guantánamo detainees — four Syrians, a Palestinian and a Tunisian — in Uruguay.

So far the biggest obstacle to releasing detainees, other than Republicans who believe in "Indefinite Detention Infinitely Extended", has been finding a country that will take them.