The US military has started secret parole hearings for detainees held indefinitely at a prison camp at the US Navy base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
The Administrative Review Board has heard the cases of three detainees since the proceedings began on Tuesday, but none of them chose to attend, said a Pentagon spokeswoman.
The United States is holding 550 detainees from more than 40 countries at Guantanamo. They are accused of links to the al-Qaeda network or the ousted Taliban regime in Afghanistan.
The new hearings, overseen by three military officers, will determine whether individual detainees remain a threat to the United States or still have intelligence value, the Pentagon spokeswoman said.
"I would anticipate people being released out of this process," she said, but declined to speculate on how many might be released.
There are three possible rulings: release, transfer to a home government or continued detention, the military said. The first decisions from the hearings should be made within the next six to eight weeks.
It was not clear when the decisions would be announced to the public.