Ibrahim Parlak, who lives in Harbert, a southwestern Michigan community near the Indiana border, had filed the appeal with the U.S. Department of Justice's Board of Immigration Appeals.

Greg Palmore, a Detroit-based spokesman for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said Tuesday afternoon he did not have more information about the ruling.

Parlak, 43, who owns a popular Middle Eastern-themed restaurant in Harbert, has said he would take his case to the federal courts if he lost his appeal before the board.

The government wants to deport Parlak, who was granted asylum in 1992, because of his past ties to the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, in Turkey. The U.S. State Department classified the PKK as a terrorist group in 1997.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security says Parlak did not disclose important details about his separatist activities in his original asylum application and omitted his conviction in Turkey from subsequent immigration forms.

His lawyers point out that the Turkish security court system that convicted him has since been abolished because of international pressure. Human rights groups say the courts relied on confessions extracted by torture.