US panel recommends release of mentally ill Guantanamo detainee

Source: Agence France-Presse

US panel recommends release of mentally ill Guantanamo detainee

Issued on: 05/02/2022 - 05:30
Modified: 05/02/2022 - 05:28

Washington (AFP) – American authorities have recommended releasing a mentally ill inmate from Guantanamo Bay and repatriating him to Saudi Arabia, according to a government document published Friday.

Suspected of being Al Qaeda's intended 20th hijacker for the September 11, 2001 attacks against the United States, Mohammed al-Qahtani was tortured by interrogators at the US military base in Cuba where he has been detained for nearly two decades.

The government dropped its case against him in 2008 due to the abuse he experienced at the prison.

The detention of al-Qahtani is "no longer necessary to protect against a continuing significant threat to the security of the United States," the Periodic Review Board, a panel composed of several US national security agencies, said in a summary of its decision.

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