The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) on Tuesday awarded 100,000 euros to Saudi national Mustafa al-Hawsawi for his unlawful detention two decades ago at a suspected secret facility in Lithuania run by the US Central Intelligence Agency.
“The court concluded that Mr al-Hawsawi had been within Lithuania’s jurisdiction and that the country had been responsible for the violations of his rights under the European Convention on Human Rights,” the court said in a press release.
Al-Hawsawi is currently being held in Guantanamo Bay. He was detained in Pakistan in 2003. The US alleges that he may have been involved in the 9/11 attacks.
The ECHR found that although the man was probably not subjected to the harshest interrogation techniques, he was blindfolded or had a bag placed over his head when he was detained in Lithuania between 2005 and 2006.
According to the court, he was confined to solitary confinement, subjected to constant foot restraints, and exposed to noise and light, which was standard CIA practice under the secret detainee programme.
“The Lithuanian authorities should have known that the CIA would treat him this way in a secret prison on their territory, given the information widely available at the time about the torture, ill-treatment, and abuse of terrorism suspects in US prisons,” the report said.
“They should also have authorised his transfer to another secret CIA detention facility (in Afghanistan), where he continued to be mistreated, and to the US, where he was facing gross denial of justice and the death penalty,” it added.
The court found that Lithuania, where Mr al-Hawsawi was detained, had violated various articles of the European Convention on Human Rights, such as the prohibition of torture, the right to a fair trial, and the right to life, liberty, and security.
This was the second case before the Strasbourg Court concerning the alleged CIA prison in Lithuania. In 2018, the ECHR found that the CIA had secretly held Abu Zubaydah, another Saudi national, in Lithuania.
In late 2009, ABC News broke a story that the CIA operated a black site in Lithuania where it transported several suspects of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
A 2014 US Senate report also mentioned “Site Violet” which operated in 2005-2006. Although the redacted report does not situate the prison in Lithuania, human rights organisations believe that “Site Violet” operated in Antaviliai near Vilnius in a State Security Department’s (VSD) training centre.
The Lithuanian government has denied that the Antaviliai facility was used by the CIA to detain people. It argued at the ECHR that the facility was used for intelligence activities, while suspicious flights from the US carried communications equipment, not people.
Lithuania to comply
Lithuania will comply with the ECHR ruling on the unlawful detention of al-Hawsawi and will pay the damages awarded to him, the Justice Ministry said on Tuesday.
“Once the judgment enters into force, three months after its publication, on April 16, Lithuanian institutions will take the necessary measures to properly implement the ECHR ruling, including the payment of the monetary compensation awarded to the applicant, within the deadlines set by the ECHR,” Paulius Žeimys, spokesperson for the justice minister, told BNS.
The Justice Ministry has not said yet whether it will appeal the ECHR’s ruling.
According to the Justice Ministry, the ECHR found a violation due to Lithuania's failure to carry out a proper investigation into the actions allegedly committed against the applicant.
Lithuania was also found liable for the fact that al-Hawsawi faces the threat of the death penalty in the place where he is currently detained.
The ECHR also held that, in the context of this case, Lithuania is under an obligation to approach the US to remedy or mitigate the human rights violations currently being committed against al-Hawsawi.
Lithuania is also under an obligation to ensure that the applicant is not executed. Lithuania is further ordered to take the necessary active steps immediately as part of the domestic pre-trial investigation.
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