Delivered Into Enemy Hands - Human Rights Watch

They noted in the fax that they understood he was currently in Dutch custody and indicated
their intention to share information with the Dutch government. British intelligence stated,
“We would like to share the information on Abu Zinad with Dutch liaison in The Hague in
case they can assist us in identifying Abu Zinad if he is there.” 355 Four months later, on
August 9, 2004, Abu Farsan and his family were deported to Sudan. He knew it was likely
that less developed countries would have fewer qualms than Western governments about
sending him back to Libya, so he was very concerned that if he was sent to a non-Western
country he would in fact be returned. He said he protested strongly. “In the court I asked if
they were going to transfer me to Libya,” he told Human Rights Watch. “I told them, if you
are going to send me anywhere else, I am going to end up in Libya, so why not just send
me to Libya directly?” 356
The Netherlands sent Abu Farsan to Khartoum around August 7 or 8. His wife and son
appear to have been with him. His son was about one year old at the time. After a night in
Nairobi, they arrived in Khartoum on August 9, 2004. Sudanese authorities took him to a
detention facility and interrogated him for three days. On the fourth day, they took him to
what he describes as a “large building with air conditioning,” where two Sudanese officials
and an American—who introduced himself as being from the CIA—interrogated him.
Abu Farsan said the American agent was tall, in his early thirties, had an athletic build,
spoke very good Arabic “in a way I could completely understand,” and “had a beard like
Mohammed.”
Abu Farsan said that the CIA agent interrogated him three times, asking him about the LIFG
and its relationship with al Qaeda. He told him that the British also had a lot of intelligence
on him but Abu Farsan said he was not interrogated by British agents. At first, the CIA
agent was very polite, but when Abu Farsan did not provide the answers he wanted, the
agent began threatening that he would be sent to Libya. The CIA agent insisted that Libya
355 Ibid.
356 The UN Committee against Torture has held that under article 3 of the Convention against Torture, which prohibits the
return or extradition of a person to another state where there are substantial grounds for believing that he would be
subjected to torture, the risk of torture must be assessed not just for the initial receiving state, but also to states to which the
person may be subsequently expelled, returned, or extradited. UN Committee against Torture, “Implementation of article 3 of
the Convention in the context of article 22,” General Comment No. 1, U.N. Doc. 11/21/1997.A/53/44, annex IX, CAT General
Comment No. 01. (General Comments),
http://www.unhchr.ch/tbs/doc.nsf/(Symbol)/13719f169a8a4ff78025672b0050eba1?Opendocument (accessed June 26,
2012), para. 2.
DELIVERED INTO ENEMY HANDS 114