Europeans Cheer Ruling on Guantanamo Trials

Although European political leaders have pressed their U.S. counterparts to close Guantanamo, members of their intelligence agencies are regular visitors to the prison and have been allowed to conduct interrogations there. In some cases, European intelligence agencies assisted in the capture of terrorism suspects later taken to Guantanamo.

For instance, the British security service known as MI5 played an instrumental role in the arrest of two British residents, Jamil el-Banna and Bisher al-Rawi, who are imprisoned at Guantanamo. According to documents and interviews, MI5 agents tipped off the CIA that the two men were on their way to the West African nation of Gambia for a business trip in November 2002.

The men were taken into custody as soon as they landed on a flight from London, then were taken by the CIA to a secret prison in Afghanistan and then to Cuba. Documents suggest that both men were abducted after MI5 pressured them into working for the British government as informants, but they refused.

Despite pleas from their families, who say the men are innocent of any wrongdoing, Britain refused for years to intervene on their behalf on the grounds that they are not British citizens, only longtime residents. Under pressure from a lawsuit, the British government agreed in March to seek Rawi's release, but his relatives said officials are still dragging their feet.

"I think from the American standpoint, the Americans want to release him, but the British do not want to play the same game," Wahab al-Rawi, the brother of Bisher al-Rawi, said in a telephone interview. "It's one of two things. Either the British government is embarrassed by what it has done, or else it is a matter of malice. It's one or the other."

News researcher Julie Tate in Washington contributed to this report.