In his first interview since he tasted freedom after 12 years behind bars, Ahmad tells how he became the longest-serving UK prisoner to be detained without charge
This article is the subject of a legal complaint made on behalf of four former TSG officers including Mark Jones and Jon Donohue. They wish to make clear that they were not party to Mr Ahmad’s civil claim against the MPS and the settlement (in 2009) was agreed without reference to them. They have always strenuously denied and continue to deny the allegations against them. In addition, they were defendants in a criminal prosecution, based on Mr Ahmad’s allegations, and were acquitted following trial in 2011. The officers were also found to have no case to answer with regards to misconduct allegations
Babar Ahmad presses the tip of his forefinger into the middle of his forehead. “Can you see that mark?” he asks. “That’s where the shrapnel struck my skull. It’s still embedded just below that red mark – a small ball-bearing from a hand grenade, buried in the middle of my cranium.”
Ahmad, a public schoolboy who grew up in Tooting, south London, where he served in the RAF cadets, suffered the wound while attacking Bosnian Serb positions at the height of the war in Bosnia when he was aged 21.
Related: Freed terror suspect Babar Ahmad: I just want Scotland Yard to say sorry
The next morning I walked into a Bosnian military post and said: I would like to help you
If I went to trial and lost, I faced the rest of my life in prison – I couldn’t have signed the papers quickly enough
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