The UK government has been ordered to find a stash of documents two Libyans believe will prove that British spies had a hand in their torture.
Abuzid Elbuzidi and Mahdi Alharati say they were detained and tortured by the Egyptian security services in August and September 2007.
They are suing the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office, the Home Office and the Attorney General, Lord Hermer.
Mr Elbuzidi and Mr Alharati are relying on 40,000 documents their barrister Helen Law KC has named the “Tripoli cache” that were found in the Libyan capital after the fall of dictator Muammar Qaddafi.
According to court documents, they allege that MI6, the UK’s overseas spy agency, and MI5, its internal security service, shared intelligence with Libyan and Egyptian counterparts “which caused or materially contributed to their unlawful detention and torture”.
Mr Elbuzidi and Mr Alharati allege there was “close liaison, collaboration, and regular intelligence sharing” between the British, Egyptian and Libyan security services. The British passed on details about their whereabouts in Cairo to the Egyptians via the Libyans, they say.
They allege that the UK knew torture was “endemic in Libya and in Egypt” and that there was a real risk they would be tortured in either of those countries if detained there.
Mr Elbuzidi and Mr Alharati are seeking to examine the cache, which was used by the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament for a 2018 report into the UK’s role in rendition and mistreatment of prisoners following the 9/11 attacks on the US. The documents are “readily obtainable and reviewable”, they say.
In a new ruling in the case, Mr Justice Jay said he would hold a hearing behind closed doors to ascertain whether the defendants' offer to produce intelligence service policy documents is “sufficient to do justice in this case”.
Meanwhile, he ordered the Foreign Office, Home Office and Lord Hermer to “ascertain from the ISC [Intelligence and Security Committee] the location of the 40,000 documents”.
Mr Al Harati was an Arabic teacher who lived in Ireland and then returned to his homeland to be a commander in the Libyan civil war, fighting troops loyal to Qaddafi.
Mr Elbuzidi and Mr Alharati say they were tortured after the UK restored relations with Libya.
The Libyan leader met Tony Blair, then prime minister, to strike the “deal in the desert” in 2004 in which Qaddafi agreed to end his sponsorship of terrorism in return for renewed diplomatic ties. He also surrendered his chemical and nuclear weapons programmes in exchange for trade and energy contracts.
