SYDNEY, March 30 (UPI) -- An Australian who admitted he trained with al-Qaida will leave Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for Australia and has agreed to testify against other terror suspects.
David Hicks was convicted Friday of providing material support to terrorism, the Sydney Morning Herald reported.
Under a plea agreement, Hicks will be sentenced to seven years in jail. He agreed to not speak to the media for one year, to give any money he got from his story to the Australian government, and to stipulate that he had "never been illegally treated by any persons in the control or custody of the United States," the Morning Herald reported.
In his confession, Hicks admitted that in 2001 he went to Afghanistan, where he trained with al-Qaida and met Osama bin Laden and conducted surveillance on the former U.S. Embassy in Kabul.
He was captured later that year while trying to flee Afghanistan and has spent five years at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay. He is expected to begin serving a jail sentence in Australia in about two months.
His father, Terry Hicks, told the Morning Herald: "He's had five years of absolute hell. I think anyone in that position if they were offered anything they would take it."
