CIA officers could face trial in Britain over Gitmo inmate torture allegations

London, Oct 31 : Senior US intelligence officers could be put on trial in Britain after it emerged last night that the Attorney General is to investigate allegations that a British resident held in Guantanamo Bay was brutally tortured, after being arrested and questioned by American forces following the terrorist attacks on New York in 2001.

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith has asked Baroness Scotland to consider bringing criminal proceedings against CIA officers allegedly responsible for the rendition and abuse of Binyam Mohamed, when he was held in prisons in Morocco and Afghanistan.

The development follows criticism of US prosecutors by British judges who have seen secret evidence of torture committed against Mohamed, including allegations his torturers used a razor blade to repeatedly cut his penis, The Independent reported.

The Attorney's investigation is expected to include allegations that MI5 colluded in Mohamed's rendition. Mohamed, 30, an Ethiopian national and British resident, was arrested in Pakistan in 2002, when a MI5 officer questioned him.

On Tuesday, Government lawyers wrote to the judges hearing Mohamed's case against the UK government in the High Court.

In the letter they said "the question of possible criminal wrongdoing to which these proceedings has given rise has been referred by the Home Secretary to the Attorney general for consideration as an independent minister of justice".

Baroness Scotland has been sent secret witness statements given to the court and public interest immunity certificates for the proceedings.

Mohamed, 30, accuses MI5 agents of lying about what they knew of CIA plans to transfer him to a prison in north Africa, where he claims he was subjected to horrendous torture.

Mohamed, who won asylum in the UK in 1994, has been charged with terrorism-related offences. He awaits a decision on whether he is to face trial at the US naval base. He is officially the last Briton at Guantanamo.

He was first held in Pakistan in 2002, where a British agent interrogated him; he was then sent to Morocco by the CIA and allegedly tortured for 18 months.

He was rendered to the secret "Dark Prison" in Afghanistan, where his torture is alleged to have continued. Since September 2004, he has been in Guantanamo Bay.

ANI