April 20, 2006: British Government Demands Al-Rawi Be Released from Guantanamo after It Is Revealed He Was British Informant

Bisher al-Rawi, a long-time British resident originally from Iraq, has been held in the Guantanamo prison since March 2003. He had previously worked as an informant for MI5, a British intelligence agency. MI5 had the CIA arrest him based on information it knew to be false, apparently in an attempt to pressure him to resume working as an informant. Al-Rawi had been keeping his MI5 ties secret, but in March 2006 his lawyer exposes them in an article in The Independent. A similar article soon appears in the Washington Post. [Independent, 3/16/2006; Washington Post, 4/2/2006] That same month, he sues the British government for passing false information about him to the CIA. The British had been refusing to help him get released from Guantanamo on the grounds that he is a British resident and not a British citizen. But on April 20, it is reported that British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw has formally written to the US and demanded his release. The Guardian reports, “Government officials [do] not deny that Mr. Straw’s change of heart was to do with Mr. al-Rawi’s links with MI5.” Al-Rawi’s lawyer says: “I see this as a positive development. I’m only left to ask the question what took so long. Did they need the judicial challenge to do the right thing?” [Guardian, 4/20/2006]