Saifullah Paracha, a businessman apprehended in 2003 as well as suspected of bankrolling al-Qaeda, never was charged, as are the majority of inmates.
Saifullah Paracha, the oldest detainee at the US-run Guantanamo Bay detention center in Cuba, has been released to his homeland Pakistan after nearly 20 years of incarceration without trial, according to the South Asian country’s foreign ministry.
“The Foreign Ministry has finalized a comprehensive inter-agency process to facilitate Mr Paracha’s repatriation,” the ministry said in a statement released on Saturday.
“We are relieved that a Pakistani citizen who has been detained abroad has been reconciled with his family.”
Businessman Paracha was arrested in Thailand in 2003 and suspected of bankrolling the armed group, but stood by his innocence and expressed his love for the United States.
The US authorized Paracha’s discharge in May, concluding only that he posed “no sustained threat” to the US.
Paracha, like most inmates at Guantanamo, was never officially charged and had minimal legal standing to challenge his incarceration.
The US military prison was set up in the aftermath of 9/11 to house suspected al-Qaeda members held captive during the 2001Afghan invasion
However, 732 of the 780 inmates detained during the US’s so-called “war on terror” were released without charges. Several of them had been incarcerated for over a decade without any legal recourse.
Close to 40 inmates continue to stay in the world’s most notorious detention facility, which has emerged as a symbol of human rights violations.
On Saturday, Pakistani national Abdul Rabbani, 55, as well as Yemeni native Uthman Abdul al-Rahim Uthman, 41, returned home after US President Joe Biden authorised their discharge last year.
Biden has been under pressure to release uncharged Guantanamo detainees and proceed with the trials of those alleged to have direct ties to al-Qaeda.
Of the approximately 40 remaining inmates are several men accused of playing direct involvement in 9/11 as well as other al-Qaeda attacks.
Paracha, who studied in the United States, ran an import-export company that supplied major US retail outlets.
Authorities in the United States accused him of interacting directly with al-Qaeda figures such as Osama bin Laden as well as Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.
Paracha’s lawyer stated in 2008 that the businessman met bin Laden in 1999 and once more a year later in relation to the production of a tv program.
Reprieve, a human rights organization based in the United Kingdom, described Paracha as a “forever prisoner.”
Guantanamo is renowned for human rights violations as well as the fact that the US government didn’t consider its inmates to be entitled to any protection under international law since its inception.
