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A Kenyan terrorism suspect who has been languishing at the US detention facility in Guantanamo, Cuba, since 2007 has been cleared for release.

The Kenyan, identified as Mohammed Abdul Malik Bajabu was cleared for release alongside Guled Hassan Duran; a Somalia national, by the Periodic Review Board —a government entity established during the Barack Obama administration to determine whether detainees at the facility were guilty.

Bajabu’s relatives in Mombasa were elated with the news, with his elder sister Mwajuma Rajab telling People Daily she was too excited that she had to take medicine to contain her blood pressure. 

Extremist training

She says he was a down to earth and God fearing gentleman who never troubled anyone. “I am his elder sister, we shared a father but our mothers were different.

He has two brothers and I am the one who brought him up after his mother died,” explained Rajab.

She says Bajabu was born in Kaloleni area of Kisumu and not Uganda as alleged. He was born to a Luhya mother from Vihiga County,  before they travelled to Mombasa while he was still young. 

He went to Madrasa in Majengo Ropa under Mwalimu Kassim and went to Tudor Primary School.

“He arrived in Mombasa alongside his mother when he was between five to seven years old and they lived in  Msaji area of Majengo in Mombasa.  He was taught in day madrassa by Mwalimu Kassim who is still alive to date. His was taught by the late Ramadhan Fundi for his night Madrassa,” she explained.

After Tudor Primary, Bajabu would be employed by a businessman called Islaim Ali for casual jobs where his jobs was loading and unloading cartons of maize flour.

“He thereafter went to study in Sudan before he started traveling around doing his businesses. He also used to sell fish,” explained Rajab.

She says it was during his involvement with the fish business when he “disaperaed in Somalia where he allegedly started his big fish outlet.

“He married in Somalia and they had three children. By the time of his arrest, his last born was three months old,” she explains

Bajabu is thought to have been inspired by a radical imam to leave Kenya in 1996 to receive extremist training in Somalia where he developed a close relationship with members of the Al Qaeda cell East Africa (AQEA).

He would later become the militant group’s facilitator in the region and was closely involved in the preparation and execution of the Kikambala terror attack in November 2002.

Thirteen people were killed and 80 injured in the raid against the Israeli-owned Paradise Hotel in Kenya’s north Coast.

In February 2007, Bajabu was arrested by Kenyan authorities for his involvement in the attack and extradited to the US a few weeks later.

Mark Maher; a staff attorney for the human rights group Reprieve US, who represents him, Bajabu has been in detention since then.

US Department of Defence filings show that Bajabu was a facilitator for al Qaeda in East Africa, before he was detained. He was never charged with any crimes.

The Periodic Review Board noted that its decision to clear Bajabu for release was based on his “low level of training and lack of leadership role in his pre-detention activities”.

“Today’s decision is wonderful news for Abdul Malik, who has been unjustly detained for 15 years without charge or trial,” Maher told CNN. “He longs to be reunited with his family, and we hope the Biden administration will ensure his release happens quickly.”

High value detainee

Bajabu and Duran were cleared for release as the notorious detention facility marks 20 years this week since it was opened under the George W. Bush administration, a few months after the September 11 terrorist attacks, according to CNN.

Current US President Joe Biden has said publicly that he wants to close the detention facility, and the National Security Council is undergoing a review of the facility “to determine the way forward,” CNN quoted Pentagon spokesman John Kirby.

The prison is notorious for human rights abuses that occurred there when prisoners, were tortured under the Central Intelligence Agency’s so-called “enhanced interrogation techniques” programme.

Duran is the first “high value” detainee to be cleared by the Periodic Review Board, his attorney told CNN. Duran was taken into US custody in 2004 and has been detained at Guantanamo without charges since September 2006, according to the Centre for Constitutional Rights, which represents him.

The Defence Department documents state that Duran supported and served as a “key member” of al Qaeda in East Africa’s network in Somalia.

Duran testified in publicly available court documents that he had been tortured, when he was held at a CIA-operated black site after first being taken into US custody. 

He described hours of interrogation with sleep deprivation, little food or water and sexual abuse from interrogators.

With these two decisions, 15 detainees have now been cleared for transfer by the Periodic Review Board and are eligible for release, pending diplomatic arrangements, the CNN reported.

Once a detainee is cleared for release, he cannot leave the prison until the American government works out a diplomatic arrangement with another country for them to be released to.

Thirty-nine detainees remain at the prison, according to Kirby. All the detainees who are eligible for transfer out of the prison have undergone a review by the Periodic Review Board since the start of the Biden administration, Kirby added.

For those detainees who have been cleared for release, “the diplomatic process is underway to work to transfer or repatriate them as appropriate,” Kirby said.