Guantanamo prisoner reseized in Russia on suspicion

Russian police have arrested a former Guantanamo Bay prisoner on suspicion of taking part in this month’s bloody attack on the southern Russian spa town of Nalchik.

Rasul Kudayev, who was returned to Russia in February last year, was detained on Sunday at his home in Nalchik.

According to Interfax he was arrested after police questioned participants in the October 13 raid on Nalchik, the capital of the republic of Kabardino-Balkariya, in which at least 128 people were killed. It said that Kudayev, 24, was suspected of taking part in an attack on a traffic police post in the village of Khasanye, near Nalchik.

Kudayev was one of eight Russian citizens arrested by US troops as “enemy combatants” in Afghanistan in 2001 and taken to Camp X-Ray at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Russian prosecutors visited in 2002 and demanded that the so-called “Russian Talibs” be extradited. In February last year, seven were handed back to Russia, where they were charged with illegal crossing of a state border, mercenary activities and participation in a criminal gang. The charges were dropped and the men released in June last year.

Kudayev himself said in the report that he had studied Islam in Saudi Arabia before joining the Taleban. Among others he complained about his treatment at Guantanamo, The Times reports.