The three-judge panel sided with the Obama administration, ruling that US courts do not have jurisdiction over the legal petitions by the prisoners at the Bagram base in Afghanistan and ordering that their cases be dismissed.
The Obama administration, taking the same legal position as the previous Bush administration despite protests by civil liberties groups, had argued that the detainees at the Bagram base have no right to have their cases heard in federal court in Washington.
US District Judge John Bates last year rejected that argument and ruled that three detainees at Bagram who sued the US government can proceed with their bid to win their freedom.
But the appeals court in a unanimous decision reversed his ruling.
It drew a distinction between the situation at Bagram and the situation at the US military prison at Guantanamo, which now holds about 180 foreign terrorism suspects. The Obama administration has pledged to close the Guantanamo prison.
"While it is true that the United States holds a leasehold interest in Bagram, and held a leasehold interest in Guantanamo, the surrounding circumstances are hardly the same," the appeals court said in an opinion written by Chief Judge David Sentelle.
The United States has maintained total control over the Guantanamo base for more than 100 years, but there is no indication the United States intends to permanently occupy the Bagram base, he said.
Sentelle also said Bagram remains in a theater of war, unlike Guantanamo, and is not under US sovereignty.
"The United States holds the detainees pursuant to a cooperative arrangement with Afghanistan on territory as to which Afghanistan is sovereign," he said in the 26-page opinion.
There are more than 800 prisoners held inside the Bagram base.
The ruling involved three detainees from countries other than Afghanistan - Fadi al Maqaleh and Amin al Bakri from Yemen and Redha Al-Najar from Tunisia. They say they were taken into custody in 2002 or 2003.
The US Supreme Court ruled in 2008 that the Guantanamo prisoners can challenge their confinement in US courts, but it has refused to allow similar lawsuits by those who were held by the US military in Iraq.
