Mohammed el Gharani

Jérôme Tubiana published the story from El-Gharani’s point of view. This was adapted to a graphic novel drawn by Alexandre Franc under the title Guantánamo Kid [fr] . The comic is released in English, French and German (Dargaud) translation and endorsed by Amnesty International.

On January 14, 2009, U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon ordered the release of Gharani because the evidence that he was an enemy combatant was mostly limited to statements from two other detainees whose credibility had been called into question by US government staff. Gharani's attorney Zachary Katznelson said after the ruling "Judge Leon did justice today. This is an innocent kid when he was seized illegally in Pakistan and should never have been in prison in the first place."

Following this, Mohammed was taken to the US run Bagram Air Force Base in Afghanistan. Here it is claimed that he was kept naked for days, and subjected to racial abuse. After being held in Bagram for two months, Mohammed was transferred to Guantanamo Bay where he remained for seven and a half years. Eventually, in 2009 with the help of Reprieve lawyers, Mohammed won a court order for his release. He was subsequently released and sent to Chad.

On January 14, 2009, US District Court Judge Richard Leon ordered Al Qarani's released. Leon dismissed all the US allegations that Al Garani had been observed in Afghanistan, because there was no evidence to support them—other than denunciations from two other captives—captives whose credibility he questioned.

Muhammad Al Qarani was allowed his first phone call home on April 16, 2009. However, instead, he phoned former captive, recently released Al Jazeera journalist Sami Al Hajj. He told Al Hajj that conditions had worsened after the election of United States President Barack Obama. Al Qarani was repatriated less than two months after the call, on June 13, 2009.

On June 11, 2009, the Department of Justice reported that they had repatriated an Iraqi captive and a Chadian captive from Guantanamo to their home countries.

The BBC reports that after his repatriation Al Garani has not been able to receive any official identity documents, because Chad officials are not sure he is actually a citizen. They report that since Al Garani grew up in Saudi Arabia he is unable to speak to any other Chadians in their local language. Saudi Arabia had, as of 2009, refused to allow Al Qarani to return and be united with his parents.

Historian Andy Worthington, reporting on April 25, 2008, in the Lebanon Daily Star, described abuse Al Qaranhi reports experiencing. The abuse Al Qaranhi reports include:

On July 14, 2006, the Boston Globe reported on investigations they made to test the credibility of the allegations against Guantanamo detainees. Al Gharani was one of the detainees whom they profiled.

The Department of Defense reported, on June 10, 2006, that three detainees committed suicide.

The Independent said Gharani was accused of plotting with Abu Qatada, in London, in 1999 – when he was a 12-year-old, living with his parents, in Saudi Arabia. He was detained for seven years in the United States Guantanamo Bay detention camps.

The Globe reported that Al Gharani was alleged to have been part of a cell, in London, led by Abu Qatada, c. 1998 – when Al Gharani was 11 or 12 years old. According to the Globe:

Mohammed el Gharani is a citizen of Chad and native of Saudi Arabia born in 1986, in Medina. He was one of the juveniles held and tortured for seven years at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp where they estimated his age to be 15–16, though Al Jazeera reports his age to have been 14 at the time of his arrest. Human Rights lawyer Clive Stafford Smith identified Al Qarani as one of a dozen teenage boys held in the adult portion of the prison.