Gitmo Detainee Released: Nineteen Eligible for Release — 34 Remain in Custody

Majid Khan Released from Gitmo

(Was held for 10 years: Then & Now)

Gitmo detainee update – Majid Khan released to Belize who has accepted him and is family.

This update from Politico.com with this headline:

“U.S. resettles former al-Qaeda courier from Guantanamo to Belize”

U.S. officials have finally found a country — Belize — to take in a Guantanamo detainee and former al-Qaeda courier who finished serving his sentence nearly a year ago. 

FYI: Nineteen other detainees are eligible for transfer. A total of 34 detainees remain in custody and held at Guantanamo.

Majid Khan left the prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba and is now in Belize, a senior State Department official said.

Background on Khan: He is a 42-year-old Pakistani citizen who pleaded guilty in 2012 to delivering $50,000 to an al-Qaeda affiliate that financed a deadly hotel bombing in Indonesia in 2003. He was sentenced to 26 years in prison.

His sentence was later reduced after he cooperated with the government and testified about his torture at a CIA black site, thus making him eligible for release last March.

Military officers on the jury condemned the torture in a clemency letter published by the New York Times, calling it a stain on the moral fiber of America.  

Khan was granted that clemency in March of 2022, when Col. Jeffrey Wood, the convening authority for military commissions, reduced Khan’s official sentence to 10 years, time he had already served.

A senior State Department official said: “The tribunal had actually written a letter on his behalf to say that they thought that he was the guy who could really find a new home and a new lease on life and acknowledged that yes, he was a good candidate for transfer.”

In a statement provided by his lawyers, Khan said: “I have been given a second chance in life. I intend to make the most of it. I deeply regret the things that I did many years ago, and I have taken responsibility and tried to make up for them. I promise all of you, especially the people of Belize that I will be a productive, law-abiding member of society.”

Wells Dixon, Khan's lawyer at the Center for Constitutional Rights, said his client's transfer “is the culmination of decades-long litigation and advocacy ... to challenge the worst abuses of the ‘war on terror’ and close the Guantanamo Bay prison.”

Since the end of his sentence, the U.S. struggled to find a place that was willing to take Khan and his family. The Biden administration said the State Department had approached 11 countries and finally he was accepted by Belize. In a certified statement the State Department had said that Khan posed no danger to the U.S. or its allies, and Belize.

My 2 Cents: Based on the facts of this case as presented it does appear to the correct decision and hopefully history will prove it so.

Thanks for stopping by and good luck to Khan and his family in their new home in Belize.