Zacarias Moussaoui, a French national and the only person convicted in the United States over the 11 September attacks, has asked to serve the rest of his life sentence in France, his lawyer has said.
Issued on: 11/09/2026 - 15:55
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Moussaoui, now 58, has spent 20 years in a maximum security prison in Colorado after being convicted in 2006 of conspiracy in connection with the 9/11 al-Qaeda attacks, which killed nearly 3,000 people. He is serving a life sentence in solitary confinement, with no possibility of parole. His lawyer, Romain Ruiz, said a request for his transfer to France was sent to the French Justice Ministry on 3 September, under a 1983 agreement allowing convicted prisoners to be transferred between France and the United States. The request is based on what Ruiz described as "exceptional circumstances relating to the unfairness of his trial, his current conditions of detention and his family situation". Violation of rights Moussaoui arrived in the US a few weeks before the 9/11 attacks, having spent several weeks in Pakistan. He was arrested weeks before the attacks after a flight training school he attended in Minnesota became concerned by his behaviour and alerted the FBI. French intelligence services had already identified him as a person of interest when US authorities contacted them before the attacks, L'Obs magazine reported on Thursday. The transfer request refers to 9/11 documents, declassified in the US since 2021, and a 2022 report by the Federal Judicial Center, which Ruiz said identified violations of Moussaoui's rights during the legal proceedings. The report identified 12 such violations, according to Le Monde daily, including that Moussaoui's defence was unable to question potential witnesses during preparations for his trial. In addition, while Moussaoui was long portrayed as the potential 20th hijacker in the Twin Towers attack, Ruiz said the documents showed he had been preparing for a later operation and was not intended to take part in 9/11. New York marks 25th anniversary of 9/11 attacks Life in isolation Ruiz also cited what he described as his client's "family rights" and "inhuman living conditions". Moussaoui is held in isolation at ADX Florence, a federal prison in Colorado that houses some of the most dangerous prisoners in the US. All inmates remain in solitary confinement and exercise alone. Le Monde reported that Moussaoui's contacts with the outside world are largely limited to monthly phone calls with his mother and rare visits from a French diplomat. His mother, Aicha El Wafi, has seen her son only three times in 25 years and can no longer afford to travel to Colorado because of financial and health reasons, Ruiz said. "I wait every month for the day he will call me. I will never see him, and I am afraid of dying without seeing him," El Wafi told French broadcaster RMC.
