VILNIUS: A Lithuanian court has denied "victim status" to a Saudi terror suspect held in Guantanamo after allegations he may have been tortured at a secret CIA jail in the Baltic state.
The court in Vilnius dismissed a petition by Mustafa al-Hawsawi, 47, ruling that the evidence presented by his defence amounted to "assumptions" rather than "objective facts", and failed to prove the CIA ever detained him at an alleged "black site" in Lithuania.
Hawsawi's lawyer Ingrida Botyriene told AFP on Tuesday she would appeal the classified court ruling, a copy of which was seen by AFP.
Victim status would allow Hawsawi's lawyers access to material in a Lithuanian investigation into an alleged CIA black site in the country, a staunch US ally that joined the EU and NATO in 2004.
Kyra Hild, a legal advisor for the London-based Redress rights group, told AFP it "will most certainly" take the case to the European Court of Human Rights if Lithuania's appeal court rules against Hawsawi.
Lawmaker Arvydas Anusauskas, who headed parliamentary probe into alleged CIA secret jails, told AFP that terror suspects seek victim status in Europe in the hope of avoiding capital punishment in the US.
Hawsawi was captured in Pakistan in 2003 and faces the death penalty if found guilty of involvement in the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.
His lawyers claim Hawsawi was tortured at alleged secret CIA prisons for Al-Qaeda suspects in Lithuania and neighbouring Poland before being sent to the US military prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba in 2006.
- 'Apathy in EU' -
Lithuanian prosecutors reopened a probe into the alleged black site after an explosive US Senate report in 2014 detailing US torture of detainees.
The redacted public report did not name European countries involved, but rights activists said the CIA used a converted horse-riding school near Vilnius as a secret prison described as "Violet" in 2005-2006.
In 2009, a Lithuanian parliamentary probe identified two secret lock-ups which it said may have been used by Washington from 2003 to 2006.
But it noted that despite records showing aircraft from the CIA landed in Lithuania, it was impossible to say whether any Al-Qaeda suspects were aboard.
Last week the European Parliament voiced concern at the "apathy shown by member states and EU institutions" about recognising torture in US "rendition" operations on European soil, adding that those responsible must be brought to justice.
Hawsawi is the second terror suspect alleged to have been illegally detained in Lithuania, after top Al-Qaeda operative Abu Zubaydah who is also being held at Guantanamo.
In 2014, the ECHR ruled that Poland abetted the unlawful imprisonment and torture of Zubaydah and another Saudi citizen Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri in 2002-2003.
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