The British government has agreed to pay a “substantial sum” to settle a lawsuit by a Guantanamo Bay detainee who said UK intelligence agencies were complicit in his torture at secret US interrogation sites, his lawyer said Monday.

Abu Zubaydah, a Palestinian man born and raised in Saudi Arabia, was thought to be a high-ranking member of al-Qaeda, the terrorist group that carried out the September 11, 2001, terror attacks, when he was captured in Pakistan in 2002.

Zubaydah, whose real name is Zayn al-Abidin Muhammad Husayn, was tortured at so-called CIA “black sites” in third countries such as Poland and Lithuania before being transferred to the US prison at Guantanamo Bay in 2006. He has since been held without trial.

Helen Duffy, an attorney, said the confidential settlement was symbolically and practically significant for the “intolerable suffering” Abu Zubaydah endured.

She urged the UK to press for the immediate release of Abu Zubaydah and others held without charge more than 20 years after the terror attacks. As of January 2025, Abu Zubaydah was one of four so-called “forever prisoners” at Guantanamo, whom the US will not release but also cannot put on trial.

“This case is deeply relevant today, as some states ride roughshod over international law, and the world looks to........

© The Times of Israel