NEW YORK, March 30: A Yemeni terrorism suspect captured in Egypt disappeared for more than a year and a half before turning up at the US navy base in Guantanamo, Cuba, Human Rights Watch said on Tuesday. The New York-based rights watchdog said ‘Abd al-Salam’ Ali Al Hila had been detained by Egyptian officials before showing up among US-held terrorism suspects at the Cuban base.

The businessman and intelligence officer was implicated in the support of radical Arab groups in the 1990s before his arrest in 2002, Human Rights Watch said in a statement. “Al Hila was essentially kidnapped on the streets of Cairo and then disappeared in US custody,” said John Sifton, a researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Whatever the allegations against him, Al Hila should have been charged and given the opportunity to challenge his detention,” he said in a statement.

“The Al Hila case is not unique,” the rights group said, citing detainees at Guantanamo who were captured not on a field of battle, but held without the protection granted criminal suspects on US territory.—AFP