A terror suspect who received a seven-figure payoff after he claimed he was tortured while being held at Guantanamo Bay blew himself up in a suicide bombing in Iraq, according to reports Tuesday.
ISIS claimed responsibility and praised Abu-Zakariya al-Britani, a British-born suicide bomber, for the attack near Mosul, where Iraqi forces are battling ISIS fighters for control of the city.
“The martyrdom-seeking brother Abu Zakariya al-Britani — may Allah accept him — detonated his explosives-laden vehicle on a headquarters of the Rafidhi army and its militias in Tal Kisum village, southwest of Mosul,” the terrorist group said.
The statement did not say when the bombing took place or whether there were casualties.
But The Associated Press reported that a series of suicide bombings in that area of Mosul on Sunday killed at least seven soldiers.
A report on BBC.com identified al-Britani (“the Briton”) as Ronald Fiddler, who was seized by American forces in Afghanistan and taken to Guantanamo in 2002.
The report said Fiddler, 50, of Manchester, England, became Jamal al-Harith when he converted to Islam in his 20s. He later took the name Abu Zakariya al-Britani.
Documents from the US Defense Department said al-Britani was held at Guantanamo for his connections to al Qaeda terrorists and because he “possesse[d] a high threat to the US, its interests and allies.”
But he was set free in 2004 after British then-Home Secretary David Blunkett, a member of Prime Minister Tony Blair’s government, lobbied for his release, saying he had been abused while detained.
At the time of his release, Blunkett said, “No one who is returned . . . will actually be a threat to the security of the British people.”
Al-Britani was returned to England and released without charges.
Later that year, he filed a lawsuit claiming “cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment” at the hands of British agents while being held.
The British government eventually paid him a million-pound settlement, about $1.25 million, according to several reports.
He used some of the money to buy a home, but then disappeared, according to British newspapers.
“It’s unbelievable that he’s been allowed to go and fight in Syria without anyone noticing. We have paid him to become a terrorist,” a former neighbor of al-Britani told Express.co.uk in 2015.