WASHINGTON , USA — A military panel at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba recommended 23 years in detention for two Malaysian men in connection with the deadly 2002 bombings in Bali.

According to a report from The Associated Press, a spokesman for the military commission made the announcement on Friday.

AP News said the recommendation follows on the heels of guilty pleas earlier this month under plea bargains for longtime Guantanamo detainees, Mohammed Farik Bin Amin and Mohammed Nazir Bin Lep and marks comparatively rare convictions in the two decades of proceedings by the US military commission at Guantanamo.

The extremist group Jemaah Islamiyah killed 202 Indonesians, foreign tourists and others in two nearly simultaneous bombings at nightspots in Bali.

According to AP News, the two defendants denied any role or advance knowledge of the attacks but under the plea bargains admitted they had over the years conspired with the network of militants responsible.

The sentence recommendation still requires approval by the senior military authority over Guantanamo.

As part of their plea bargains, the two Malaysian men have agreed to provide testimony against a third Guantanamo detainee, an Indonesian man known as Hambali, in the Bali bombings.

The US has held the two men at Guantanamo since 2006.