U.S. transfers Suspected Senior al Qaeda Member to Mauritania

{{The United States Department of Defense denied claims by a prisoner’s rights group in Mauritania, which announced on Saturday that the U.S. had returned three prisoners to the Mauritania, including two men who had been held at the Guantanamo Bay prison.}}

No detainees have been transferred from Guantanamo since October last year, said Army Lt. Col. Joseph Todd Breasseale, a U.S. Defense Department spokesman.

Mauritania officials announced saturday that Younis al-Mauritani, a suspected senior member of al Qaeda previously held in Afghanistan had been transfered to Mauritaria.

Pakistan said in September 2011 it arrested al-Mauritani, better known in his homeland Mauritania as Youssouf Al Mauritani, during a joint operation with U.S. intelligence services.

Witnesses at the airport in Mauritania’s capital, Nouakchott, saw a U.S. military plane deliver a prisoner late on Friday.

Mauritanian authorities confirmed al-Mauritani’s identity, adding that he had been transferred from the U.S. military base in Bagram, Afghanistan.

“It’s indeed Youssouf Al Mauritani, real name Abderhamane Ould Mohamed Al-Hussein,” a senior security official told media asking not to be named.

“He was in Bagram and was handed over to the Mauritanian authorities by the Americans. He indeed arrived at the Nouakchott airport Friday night,” he said.

{Agencies}