LONDON/ WASHINGTON (AlArabiya.net, Agencies)
A Qatari man held at Guantanamo Bay until last year was detained at London's Heathrow Airport early Wednesday on his way to visit a human rights lawyer in the capital.
Jaralla Saleh Mohammed Kahla al-Marri said he arrived in Britain from Qatar on Sunday to visit lawyer Gareth Peirce but was questioned by British immigration officials because he did not include details of his time at Guantanamo Bay on his visa application.
" They kept me for an hour then said they were going to move me...They said I was going back to my own country. They said they don't want anyone from Guantanamo here " Jaralla al-Marri "They kept me for an hour then said they were going to move me," al-Marri, who is currently being held at Colnbrook Immigration Removal Center near the airport, was quoted by Britain's domestic Press Association as saying.
"They said I was going back to my own country. They said they don't want anyone from Guantanamo here."
Al-Marri, who was held in Guantanamo Bay for more than six years before returning to Qatar in July, added: "I said I was here in January and it was fine and if they don't want me here why did they give me a visa?" |
"There was no question on the visa about are you a Guantanamo detainee?"
A spokesman for Britain's Home Office said he was unable to comment on individual cases.
Al-Marri's ordeal comes a day after Binyam Mohamed, a 30-year-old Ethiopian-born detainee, was released from Guantanamo and arrived in Britain, where he held residency before his detention at the prison camp.
"I have been through an experience that I never thought to encounter in my darkest nightmares," Mohamed said in a statement.
"It is still difficult for me to believe that I was abducted, hauled from one country to the next, and tortured in medieval ways-- all orchestrated by the United States government." |
