Guantanamo Bay Prisoner Freed in Belize After 20 Years in US Custody

The entrance to Camp VI, a prison used to house detainees at the U.S. Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, on March 5, 2013. Bob Strong/Reuters

The U.S. government has released and transferred a Pakistani man from the Guantanamo Bay detention facility in Cuba to Belize.

The U.S. Defense Department said on Thursday that Majid Khan, 42, had been transferred to Belize after serving his sentence at the U.S.-run detention center for over a decade.

Khan, a native of Pakistan, came to the United States with his family in the 1990s and grew up outside of Baltimore, The Baltimore Sun reported.

In 2012, Khan admitted to conspiring with members of the al Qaeda Islamist militant organization and to providing material support for terrorism and spying.

“I deeply regret the things that I did many years ago, and I have taken responsibility and tried to make up for them. I continue to ask for forgiveness from God and those I have hurt. I am truly sorry,” he said in a statement issued by his legal team.

Khan said that he hopes to start a new life in Belize and start a business there.

“The world has changed a lot in twenty years, and I have changed a lot as well. I promise all of you, especially the people of Belize that I will be a productive, law-abiding member of society,” he added.

Majid Khan in 2018. Center for Constitutional Rights via AP

Capture and Detention

Khan was captured in Pakistan in 2003 and taken to an unidentified CIA “black site,” where he was subjected to a harsh interrogation program. He was later transferred to the detention camp at Guantanamo Bay in 2006.

The Pentagon said that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin notified Congress of his intent to transfer Khan last year, and that the necessary procedures were followed after consultations with partners from Belize.

Speaking to reporters, Belizean foreign minister Eamon Courtenay said the U.S. government would provide all the funds to cover Khan’s integration into Belizean society, including housing and initial living expenses.

The Belizean government regards Khan’s resettlement as “a humanitarian act,” Courtenay said, adding that Khan would be free to travel throughout Belize and live the rest of his life however he chooses.

“Khan is not in Belize as a detainee. He has served his sentence and is a free man,” Courtenay said. “Khan is not a terrorist, he has fully recanted, accepted responsibility for his action and asked Allah for forgiveness, and he has been de-radicalized.”

Wells Dixon, an attorney at the Center for Constitutional Rights that represents Khan, said he hoped that Khan’s resettlement would serve as an example for other countries.

“Belize has done an outstanding job to prepare for his resettlement, and their success serves as a model for other countries to accept men who no one thinks should remain at Guantanamo but who cannot return to their home countries for humanitarian reasons,” Dixon said.

Khan Describes Treatment by CIA

In a 39-page statement that Khan read aloud to a U.S. military sentencing commission in 2021, he described his treatment at the CIA site. Khan said he was beaten, subjected to the simulated drowning technique called waterboarding, and sexually assaulted.

Khan also said that he had been deprived of sleep and food and was kept isolated and shackled in a cell with music blaring 24 hours a day. This went on for three years, from the time of his arrest in Karachi in 2003 until his transfer to Guantanamo in 2006, he said.

Dawn arrives at the now closed Camp X-Ray, which was used as the first detention facility for al-Qaida and Taliban militants who were captured after the Sept. 11 attacks, at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba on Nov. 21, 2013. Charles Dharapak/AP Photo

Former President George W. Bush established the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba in 2002 to house foreign terrorism suspects following the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks in New York and Washington that killed about 3,000 people.

The prison’s population peaked at about 800 inmates before it began to decline.

Khan is the first detainee to be released from Guantanamo since October, leaving 34 detainees, 20 of whom have already been deemed eligible for transfer to another country.

There were 40 detainees at Guantanamo when President Joe Biden took office in 2021. Biden has said that he hopes to close the facility. The federal government is barred by law from transferring Guantanamo detainees to U.S. mainland prisons.

“We remain dedicated to a deliberate and thorough process focused on responsibly reducing the detainee population at Guantanamo Bay and ultimately closing the facility.  That is still where we stand,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters.

Reuters contributed to this report.