LONDON, April 20 (UPI) -- The British government has demanded the release of a Guantanamo detainee who claims he was imprisoned after informing MI5 of an alleged Islamic extremist.
The Foreign Office confirmed Thursday that Foreign Secretary Jack Straw had written to U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice formally requesting that Bisher al-Rawi, a British resident, be released from the U.S. detention camp.
Al-Rawi, who has been a resident of Britain since fleeing Saddam Hussein's Iraq with his family 17 years ago, has been held by the United States without charge or trial since being seized in Gambia three years ago.
The British government has until recently refused to take up his case, arguing that it would only intercede on behalf of British citizens. But after a High Court challenge during which al-Rawi's lawyers claimed he had been helping the British intelligence agency keep track of extremist cleric Abu Qatada, allegedly Osama bin Laden's spiritual ambassador in Europe, the government performed an about face.
Official documents submitted to the court also indicated that British security services had passed information they knew to be false to the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, leading to the seizure of al-Rawi, who claims he was visiting Gambia on business.
Al-Rawi also claims that he was told by officers from MI5 that they would intervene on his behalf should his work for the agency land him in trouble.
Government officials have not denied al-Rawi's links with MI5 nor that it was the revelation of those ties which prompted Straw's change of heart. The government did not agree to intervene on behalf of the two other British residents in Guantanamo who also appealed the decision.
