European Diary:When Moazaam Begg moved from Birmingham to Afghanistan with his family to fulfil his dream of becoming a teacher, he had no idea what lay ahead.
Following the September 11th terrorist attacks and the beginning of the war in Afghanistan, the father of four fled to Pakistan to avoid the fighting.
But in February 2002, he was detained by CIA operatives and sent to Bagram airbase in Afghanistan for interrogation.
"I was hog-tied, hooded, shackled, beaten and kicked. They threatened to send me on to Egypt to be tortured, and in my cell I heard the screaming of a woman, who they said was my wife," said Begg. "By the time they were finished with me I was glad to be sent on to Guantánamo Bay." Begg is one of nine British Muslims who were detained at the notorious US military base in Cuba for years without charges ever being filed. Since his release in January 2005 he has campaigned with Amnesty International for the camp's closure and the end of extraordinary rendition, where suspects are kidnapped and secretly interrogated.
"I don't believe President Bush when he says he wants to close Guantánamo. They have just built two new permanent detention facilities which don't offer any natural light to the inmates.
"About 385 people are still there living in separate cells with no charges laid against them," Begg told The Irish Times yesterday.
Begg's experience is similar to scores of testimonies from victims of rendition that the European Parliament's temporary committee of inquiry into the activities of the CIA has examined in recent years.
Yesterday a delegation of MEPs who sat on the committee travelled to Washington to meet US officials, with the issue of human rights high on the agenda.
"Guantánamo and rendition is damaging to the US reputation in Europe, but more importantly the reputation of the western world Muslim world. When we talk about democracy and human rights people are asking why don't people practise what they preach?" says Cem Özdemir, MEP and vice-chair of the temporary committee.
"After our investigation into rendition in the European Parliament questions still remain about Europe's role in the practice. We will only get information with the help of the US. The good news is Democrats are in control of the Congress now," he says.
Yet it seems unlikely that a Democrat-controlled Congress would be in a position to provide much information on European governments' role in specific rendition cases that occurred in Germany and Italy.
The closure of the detention centre at Guantánamo and the extraordinary rendition programme are likely to be raised by EU officials at the EU-US summit later this month. But there is no sign that EU governments have the stomach to investigate a rendition programme that many are complicit in, according to Florian Geyer, an analyst with the Centre for European Policy Studies think-tank. "So far there has been no formal reaction from the council or member states to the European Parliament's report. They have signalled that they are happy to leave it and not go any further," says Geyer.
For Begg, who published the book Enemy Combatant on his experiences in Guantánamo last year, the answer is simple: human rights need to be protected.
"The experience of British soldiers captured by Iran shows that they came home fine and did not experience torture," he said. "But unfortunately Guantánamo still exists."