combatant against the United States. In fact, he was fighting on the same side as the United States, which in 1992 supported the Mujahideen fight against the communist government in Afghanistan. Slahi's cousin and former brother-in-law is Mahfouz Ould al-Walid, also known as Abu Hafs al-Mauritani. Before the September 11 attacks in the United States, Al-Walid was a spiritual adviser to Osama bin Laden, was on the Shura council of al Qaeda, and headed the sharia council. However, two months before the attacks, al-Walid, along with several other al Qaeda members, wrote a letter to bin Laden opposing the planned attacks. Al-Walid left al Qaeda after the attacks. While al-Walid was in Sudan, where al Qaeda was based in the mid-1990s, he twice asked Slahi to help him get money to his family in Mauritania, about $4,000 in December 1997 and another $4,000 in December 1998. In the 2010 habeas corpus opinion for Slahi, the judge wrote: "the government relies on nothing but Slahi's uncorroborated, coerced statements to conclude that the money transfers were done on behalf of and in support of al-Qa'ida." In 1998, Slahi was heard by U.S. intelligence talking to al-Walid on a satellite phone traced to bin Laden. The 9/11 Commission Report, based on the interrogations of Ramzi bin al-Shibh, claimed that in 1999, Slahi advised three members of the Hamburg Cell to travel to Afghanistan to obtain training before waging jihad in Chechnya. However, the federal District Court in 2010 that reviewed Slahi's case found that Slahi "provided lodging for three men for one night at his home in Germany [in November 1999], that one of them was Ramzi bin al-Shibh and that there was discussion of jihad and Afghanistan." Besides Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Mr. Slahi's other two houseguests were future September 11 hijackers. Slahi claims it was merely a matter of hospitality to fellow Muslims. 1999–2002 Slahi moved to Montreal, Quebec, Canada in November 1999 because German immigration authorities would not extend his visa for residence in Germany. Since he was a hafiz, he was invited by the imam of a large mosque to lead Ramadan prayers. Ahmed Ressam, who was caught with explosives crossing the Canada–US border in December 1999 as part of the 2000 millennium attack plot, had attended the same mosque. Since Slahi was known to U.S. intelligence through contact with his cousin Mahfouz Ould al-Walid, he was suspected by them