Abdul Ra'ouf Omar Mohammed Abu al-Qassim has been held at the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for more than five years, and he longs to leave it. But the one place the U.S. government is willing to send the "enemy combatant" -- his native Libya is the country Qassim fears most.

Having exhausted all possible legal remedies in U.S. courts -- including a petition to the Supreme Court in April -- Qassim is facing possibly imminent transfer to Libya, a country that the State Department deems a regular abuser and torturer of its captives. Qassim, accused by U.S. officials of being part of a terrorist group that aims to overthrow Libya's leader, expects that returning there means torture and perhaps death.



Qassim is one of the first detainees deemed an "alien enemy combatant" who is publicly fighting his departure from Guantanamo. His attorneys and at least one member of Congress have pleaded with U.S. officials to spare him from transfer to a country known for its human rights transgressions.

Qassim is among about 80 detainees at Guantanamo who have been cleared for release or transfer, and he represents a problem that could recur many times as the United States tries to clear out the facility: sending the men into the custody of nations known to employ torture.

Human rights groups estimate that there are more than a dozen men at Guantanamo slated to go to countries with spotty rights records. Absent court intervention, the men have no choice but to go where the United States sends them.

"It's a huge problem," said Shayana Kadidal, a lawyer with the Center for Constitutional Rights who represents Qassim. "It's the number one crisis we're dealing with. A large number of people who are cleared for release are cleared to go to countries where they likely will be tortured. They will be suspect just for the fact that the U.S. has detained them for such a long period of time."