76. The US government has however accelerated the pace of transfers to third countries with 23 transfers in 2014 and 11 between January and 31 August 2015, and has reportedly secured commitments from a dozen countries to accept nearly half of the remaining detainees designated for transfer. 77. Nevertheless, six years after President Obama’s first commitment to close the detention facility, 116 detainees remain detained, 106 of them are detained without charge and 54 of them have been designated for transfer. The United States will continue to be acting in violation of international standards by holding these detainees in arbitrary detention, unless significant changes are promptly made to US transfer practices. 78. The PRB creates a greater opportunity for release by circumventing existing legislative restrictions. It determines whether the continued detention of detainees is necessary to “protect against a continuing significant threat” to US national security, and designates those detainees who can be transferred. While the accelerated pace of PRB reviews in 2015 is welcome, it will not suffice to significantly progress toward the closure of Guantánamo at this rate. Only two detainees have been released following a favourable review. ODIHR is worried that the PRB is primarily shifting detainees to another detention classification and, in some instances, can be used to detain indefinitely and without trial individuals who are determined to pose a significant threat to national security. 79. Delays in the ongoing cases before military commissions, with no scheduled starting dates of trial, further complicate the closure of Guantánamo as the detainees cannot currently be transferred to the US for detention or trial. 80. The situation of Yemeni detainees, 38 of whom have been designated for transfer for years, remains one of the primary challenges to closing Guantánamo. Restrictions on their repatriation based on their nationality and the political situation in their country may constitute a violation of the principle of non-discrimination. Despite the lifting in 2013 of President Obama’s moratorium preventing any transfer to Yemen, no detainees have been subsequently transferred there. Finding solutions to the repatriation of Yemeni detainees or their resettlement elsewhere, as a matter of extreme urgency, is key for the US government to demonstrate its commitment to the closure of the detention facility. 81. The resettlement of the Yemeni detainees, but also of detainees who may face a risk of torture or ill-treatment if repatriated, is critical to the closure of Guantánamo. ODIHR commends the 15 OSCE participating States which have resettled Guantánamo detainees, while calling on all OSCE participating States to contribute to these efforts. 82. Human Rights safeguards related to the closure of Guantánamo: non-refoulement. Under both international human rights and international humanitarian law, the principle of non-refoulement prohibits expelling, returning or extraditing an individual to another state where there are substantial grounds for believing that the person would be subjected to torture or ill-treatment. 22