Inmates at the Guantanamo Bay US detention camp had contact with the London bombers, a British newspaper reported yesterday, citing Guantanamo interrogation officials.

The Daily Telegraph said that detainees who are campaigning for their release at the High Court in London had knowledge of the terror cell which killed 56 people, the four presumed Islamist suicide bombers included, on July 7 last year.

American officials at the camp in Cuba claimed that "dozens" of the 500-odd inmates who are not British nationals had previously lived or worked in the kingdom before their capture in Afghanistan in 2001, the broadsheet said.

Three detainees, who describe themselves as British residents in papers served at the High Court, were last week given a green light to seek a court order requiring Foreign Secretary Jack Straw to petition Washington for their release.

The case is expected to be heard in mid-March.

But US interrogation officials said the detainees knew the cell responsible for blowing up three Underground trains and a bus last July.

A senior US official told the Telegraph: "After the London bombings we got a request from British intelligence to check whether these people had any knowledge of those responsible for carrying out the attacks.

"We interviewed them and they were able to provide a great deal of information about the bombings which we passed back to London."

The officials told the newspaper that the intelligence provided by the detainees related to the "training and organisational structure" of the July 7 cell.

Major-General Jay Hood, the American officer running Guantanamo, said that British security services had made several requests for information from Guantanamo inmates about the London bombings.

"There are a significant number of detainees who have either lived in or travelled through Britain before their capture," Hood was reported as saying.

"During that time they made contact with the more radical elements of the UK's Islamic population.

"We have passed the information they have provided about the London bombings to the British authorities. I believe this information has helped to prevent further attacks in the UK."

Source: China Daily