TOKYO, Nov 26: A Bangladeshi man expressed relief on Wednesday after Japan’s top court cleared him of links to the Al-Qaeda terrorist network and ordered a newspaper to pay him 23,000 dollars in compensation.

The Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected an appeal by the top-selling Yomiuri Shimbun and upheld lower court rulings that the publisher should pay a total of 2.2 million yen to Islam Mohamed Himu for damaging his reputation.

“It’s as it should be, since I did nothing wrong,” said the 38-year old businessman, who lives in Japan and had sued the newspaper for a total of 3.3 million yen.

“God sees through every human being, and if I had committed a crime, I would have accepted the punishment,” he said.

“I think that the Yomiuri kept appealing to the court because they probably thought that since I’m a foreigner, they could easily win.” Himu, who has lived in Japan since 1995 with his Japanese wife and two children, was arrested in 2004 along with four other Bangladeshis, an Indian, a Mali national and a woman from the Philippines.

Japanese media, citing unnamed police sources, prominently reported the arrests as being linked to an Al Qaeda probe, although police said at the time that the detentions were for visa violations. The reports also said Himu, who managed a telecommunications company in Japan, possibly used his firm as an underground financial source for Al-Qaeda.

—AFP