Released Guantánamo Bay detainee Binyam Mohammed was returned to the UK Feb. 23 after being held for nearly seven years. Mohamed had immigrated from Ethiopia to the UK prior to his arrest, and it is not yet known whether he will be permitted to remain in the country, whose government he has repeatedly accused of being involved in his alleged torture. Mohamed recently ended a hunger strike, and British authorities declared him healthy enough to travel last week. The UK’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) said that his return comes in response to a longstanding request for the return of UK residents held at Guantánamo.
Mohamed was arrested and sent to Guantánamo Bay in 2004 on suspicion of war crimes in connection with his alleged involvement with al Qaeda attacks on the US. The charges against him were dismissed last October. Mohamed asserts that after he was arrested in Pakistan and turned over to US officials, he was then transferred to Moroccan agents who tortured him. In December, he asked the UK government to ensure that photographic evidence of his alleged torture be preserved. (Jurist, Feb. 23)
See our last post on the detainment scandal.
