U.S. court upholds Kuwaiti's Guantanamo detention

[Robb]

Source: Reuters

(Reuters) - An appeals court upheld the detention at the U.S. military base at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba of a Kuwaiti who went to Afghanistan in 2001 to become part of the Taliban and al Qaeda forces, according to a ruling released on Wednesday.

The unanimous three-judge panel rejected an appeal by Fawzi Al Odah, whose lawyers had argued that he was a teacher who went to Afghanistan to do charity work and to teach the Koran to the poor and needy. He was captured near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border in late 2001 and has been held at Guantanamo since early 2002.

The U.S. appeals court upheld a ruling by a federal judge that sufficient evidence existed showing that al Odah had been part of the Taliban and al Qaeda forces.

The appeals court said al Odah's name and phone number appeared on a document on al Qaeda's official website, that his passport was later recovered from an al Qaeda safehouse in Karachi, Pakistan, and that two other individuals identified him as a Taliban and al Qaeda member.

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6665F920100707