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U.S. military officials said Thursday they released and sent to Belize a onetime al-Qaida courier who had completed his sentence. The transfer of Majid Khan ended an imprisonment that included torture at clandestine CIA sites and 16 years at the Guantanamo Bay detention center.
Khan, a Pakistani citizen who grew up outside Baltimore, wound up in the Central American nation under a Biden administration agreement with that government. Khan’s lawyers said he should have been freed last February under a pretrial agreement.
Khan, who is in his early 40s, said in a statement through his legal team that he deeply regretted his period of working with al-Qaida in his early 20s. That included working as a courier and taking part in planning several plots that were never carried out.
“I promise all of you, especially the people of Belize that I will be a productive, law-abiding member of society,” the statement said. “I will not let you down.”
Before arriving at the military prison on the U.S. base in Cuba in 2006, Khan spent some three years at so-called CIA black sites overseas.
