Ex-Guantanamo inmate wants 'truth' on UK rendition role

Aamer claims a British official was present while he was beaten by US interrogators at Bagram air base in Afghanistan

LONDON: A British resident held in Guantanamo for more than 13 years has called for transparency over Britain's role in the US rendition programme but has ruled out seeking criminal prosecution for British officials.

"I just want people to tell the truth, like I'm doing now," 46-year-old Shaker Aamer told the BBC on Monday in his first round of interviews since being released from the US military prison in Cuba in October.



Aamer claims that a British official was present while he was beaten by US interrogators at Bagram air base in Afghanistan following his arrest in 2002 and before his transfer to Guantanamo Bay.

Aamer, who was arrested on suspicion of being an al Qaeda recruiter, claims he was working as a volunteer for a charity at the time.

Asked by ITV whether a public inquiry was warranted, he said: "Indeed, indeed definitely. Because for you to understand what happened, to know the truth, you have to enquire, you have to ask questions."

A public inquiry is a type of official review under English law that can lead to recommendations on government policy but is not a criminal investigation.

Speaking to the BBC, the Saudi national added: "I do not want to prosecute anybody... I don't believe that the court will solve this problem".

Dominic Grieve, head of a parliamentary committee charged with overseeing Britain's security services, said he hoped Aamer would take part in an ongoing inquiry into detainee treatment and rendition.



"It would be immensely helpful to us if both Shaker Aamer but also the other detainees were to help us," Grieve told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

"And I say that fully understanding that in the end they might, after we publish the report, say they still want a full judicial inquiry," he said.

In a series of cases still being considered by Britain's court, campaigners have called for the security services to be put on trial for allegedly working together with the United States on a programme to allow terror detainees to be tortured.

In his interviews with British media, Aamer claimed brutal treatment in detention and spoke of his emotional reunion with his four children -- one of whom was born when he was already in detention.

Aamer said the treatment of detainees at Guantanamo constituted a "war crime", claiming that at different points he was forced to drink sewage water, deprived of sleep and hog-tied by his interrogators.