Mr. Asthana, the lawyer, said the actual number was higher since there were many cases where detainees could not put up a legal fight to prove they were under 18 when they committed an offense.
Yes, the number of political prisoners in Vietnam has dropped by about 50 since 2013, but few of these were released pursuant to reform steps: in many cases, released detainees simply completed their sentences and are now out on probation, effectively silenced.
In many cases, he said, detainees are kept on Navy ships until the Justice Department can build a case against them, or they are transferred to other countries for detention.
After the court ruling, Mr. Mohamed's lawyer, Clive Stafford Smith, who has handled many cases involving Guantánamo detainees, was bitterly critical of the "the shameful way" in which the British government had battled to keep secret what it knew of Mr. Mohamed's treatment.
The files include allegations that cannot be independently verified and have in many cases been contested by detainees or their lawyers.
Those who represent long-term detainees say many cases are dragging on despite the ruling.
The practice began to gain pace in January and, in many cases, appears to confirm that detainees had been dead since the early years of the conflict.
The Pentagon's press secretary, Geoff Morrell, said in many cases the documents, so-called Detainee Assessment Briefs, had been superseded by the decisions of a taskforce established by President Barack Obama in 2009.
His fellow former detainees had, in many cases, been frightened to sue the authorities, particularly in the early days of the association.
