Ludford welcomes Bisher al-Rawi release

5.44.00pm UTC (GMT +0000) Thu 29th Mar 2007

Commenting on the government's announcement today that British resident Bisher al-Rawi is to be released from Guantanamo Bay, his local Liberal Democrat MEP and vice-chair of the European Parliament's committee on extraordinary rendition Baroness Sarah Ludford said:

"I am delighted for Bisher and his family that he will finally be set free, and pay tribute to the family's determined and dignified campaign as well as the splendidly dogged British and American lawyers involved."

"Tony Blair however can take no credit. Bisher's release now does not obscure the fact that he spent an intolerable five years incarcerated and abused in Guantanamo without charge or trial after British security services' erroneous intelligence and Blair's collusion in the excesses of Bush's 'war on terror' led to his kidnap by the US."

"The British government must now demand that the other UK legal residents still in the Guantanamo black hole must either they be charged and put on trial fairly, or freed. The way the British government has washed its hands of these people, who in many cases have British wives and children, is shameful."

"I am thinking particularly of my other constituents Jamil el-Banna, abducted with Bisher, and Omar Deghayes. They and their families too deserve an end to the agony."

"A cynic might conclude that this government announcement was slyly timed to coincide with the rising of parliament for Easter recess."