WASHINGTON -LRB- CNN -RRB- -- A man who his attorney says was the youngest prisoner sent to the Guantanamo Bay detention center -- captured in Pakistan at 14 -- was ordered freed by a federal judge Wednesday . A guard keeps watch from a tower at the military facility at Guantanamo Bay , Cuba . The judge ruled Mohammad el-Gharani was not an enemy combatant and directed the military `` to take all necessary and appropriate diplomatic steps to facilitate the release '' of el-Gharani from the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay , Cuba . El-Gharani , now 21 , was among the first terrorism suspects and enemy fighters sent to the U.S. military prison camp . His arrival in 2002 came after he was seized by Pakistanis at a mosque and transferred to the U.S.-led coalition . He has been in custody since . El-Gharani 's lawyers filed a habeas corpus petition in federal court , demanding the government justify its continued detention or release him . Details of his case have not been widely released , but his lawyer said he was accused of working with al Qaeda 10 years ago , at age 11 . The court ruling also alleges el-Gharani , a citizen of Chad , was an al Qaeda courier and participated in the battle of Tora Bora in late 2001 in Afghanistan . But U.S. District Judge Richard Leon noted serious questions were raised about another detainee who implicated el-Gharani . Leon said that given the `` substantial and troubling uncertainties regarding petitioner 's conduct and whereabouts prior to his detention by Pakistani forces , the -LSB- U.S. -RSB- government has failed to establish a preponderance of the evidence '' that el-Gharani was an al Qaeda agent . The judge gave no timetable on when the suspect -- also called Yousef -- must be freed . Under U.S. and international policy , he could not be sent to a country where he might face torture or severe physical mistreatment . The Bush administration has said it has had difficulties finding countries willing to take many Guantanamo prisoners awaiting release . El-Gharani 's lawyers have alleged mistreatment by his captors , including cigarette burns and verbal abuse . Court records allege he was a native of Saudi Arabia who left that country around 2001 and moved to Pakistan . He denied that he was fleeing the fighting in Afghanistan when he was captured across the border in Pakistan . Another Guantanamo detainee , Canadian Omar Khadr , was 14 or 15 when he was captured six years ago . Military prosecutors formally charged him in April 2007 with killing Sgt. Christopher James Speer , a U.S. soldier whose reconnaissance patrol was ambushed in Afghanistan in 2002 . The American died nearly two weeks later . Khadr and el-Gharani remain among the youngest of Guantanamo 's approximately 250 prisoners . The civil case is el-Gharani v. Bush -LRB- 05-429 -RRB- .