Sat, Feb 21, 2004 page6

• Five Guantanamo Bay Britons to be sent home

  NO THREAT It will be hard to try the men in the UK, as evidence gained from them in Cuba will be inadmissible in a British court, but they could face further investigation

  • AP
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  Five of the nine British terrorist suspects held at the US military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, will soon return home and face further investigation by anti-terrorist police here, officials said.

  Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said on Thursday that discussions were continuing about the other four detained Britons, who are among about 650 prisoners being held at the US naval base on suspicion of being al-Qaeda or Taliban fighters.

  Straw said the five would be flown back "in the next few weeks" and that it was up to prosecutors whether they would face trial.

  "The police will consider whether to arrest them ... for questioning in connection with possible terrorist activity," Straw told reporters.

  "There are a range of security and other issues, which we and the Americans need to consider in respect of the four men."

  London's Metropolitan Police force said its anti-terrorist branch was investigating the five Britons and would contact their families and lawyers.

  It declined to say whether it would send officers to accompany the men back to Britain.

  Britain's top law enforcement official, Home Secretary David Blunkett, said none of the five "will actually be a threat to the security of the British people."

  Earlier Thursday, Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen told his parliament that a Dane held at the base for two years will soon be released and return to Denmark a free man.

  Five other Guantanamo prisoners -- a Spaniard and four Saudi Arabians -- were recently released and returned to their countries for detention or possible prosecution.

  At the White House, spokesman Scott McClellan said the US has received assurances from Denmark and Britain that the detainees being released will not pose "any future threat to America or our friends and allies."

  Experts claimed, however, that it would be difficult to try the five Britons here, as evidence gleaned from them in Guantanamo would generally not be admissible in court.

  The announcement followed months of negotiations between US and British authorities.

  Prime Minister Tony Blair has come under intense pressure from lawmakers within his own party to secure the release of the Britons, who have been held for up to two years.

  The US says the many prisoners at Guantanamo, who come from 42 countries, are "enemy combatants," not prisoners of war, and can be tried by military tribunals.

  But human rights groups insist their detention is unlawful.

  The US Supreme Court will decide this year whether the detainees at Guantanamo can be held indefinitely without lawyers and hearings.

  The British government named the five Britons to be released as Rhuhel Ahmed, 23; Tarek Dergoul, 24; Jamal al-Harith, 35; Asif Iqbal, 20; and Shafiq Rasul, 25.

  The four Britons who will remain at Guantanamo include Moazzam Begg, 36, and Feroz Abbasi, 23, who had been listed as some of the first detainees likely to face a military commission there. The other two men are Richard Belmar, 23, and Martin Mubanga, 29.

  Straw said that Britain's attorney general believed that "the military commissions, as presently constituted, would not provide the type of process which we would afford British nationals."
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