ISLAMABAD, 5 November 2003 — A Pakistani freed from the US military camp at Guantanamo has filed a case in a local court seeking $10.4 million in damages from the United States for his “illegal detention, torture and humiliation.”
Mohammad Sagheer, 53, filed the petition at the court of Islamabad’s senior civil judge Mohammad Arshad two days ago.
Sagheer’s lawyer, Ikram Chaudhry, said the judge will allow the petition to be heard, probably sometime later this month.
The former prisoner has nominated as respondents the US secretary of state, secretary of defense and the Justice Department as well as the Pakistan’s Interior Ministry, Chaudhry said.
Sagheer, who hails from northwestern Kohistan city near the Afghan border, was the first Pakistani to be released in November last year from the high security, open-air Camp X-Ray prison on a US naval base in Guantanamo, Cuba.
Sagheer’s lawyer Chaudhry said another suit would be filed in a US court after consultation with human rights organizations and lawyers there.
