Bin Mohammed won his habeas corpus petition last November, but was so scared of returning to Algeria that the judge in his case, Judge Gladys Kessler of the District Court in Washington D.C., tried to prevent his enforced return, eventually losing that appeal in the Conservative-dominated D.C. Circuit Court, and then losing again on July 16, when the Supreme Court also refused to act on his behalf. When Abdul Aziz Naji’s appeal was denied by the Supreme Court the following day, the last obstacle to the enforced repatriation not only of bin Mohammed, but also of Nabil Hadjarab, Motai Saib, Djamel Ameziane and Ahmed Belbacha was also removed.

As the legal action charity Reprieve reports today, “the Algerian prosecutor’s office reported on Monday that Abdul Aziz Naji was charged with an unspecified offence and is now under ‘judicial supervision.’” This may well mean that he will now undergo long months of horrible uncertainty as the government prepares to try him, even though, in the cases of other Algerians who returned voluntarily between July 2008 and January 2010, no trial has resulted in a conviction.

However, as Human Rights Watch noted after Naji’s repatriation:

Although the Algerian detainees who were returned voluntarily to Algeria have not reported serious abuse, this should not be the basis for determining how future returnees will be treated. Some of the men who returned voluntarily were elderly, in ill health, or had wound up at Guantánamo as cases of mistaken identity. Some of the remaining detainees, though never accused of any crime, might be perceived by the Algerian government as more dangerous than those who previously returned.

Senior counterterrorism counsel Andrea Prasow added, “The US needs to consider the individual circumstances of each detainee before repatriation. Someone who would rather remain at Guantánamo than go home should at least be given the chance to explain why in a proper legal setting.”

While there are valid concerns for all the men’s safety and well-being if returned to Algeria, Ahmed Belbacha is particularly vulnerable, as he was tried in absentia in November 2009 and sentenced to 20 years in prison, for what his lawyers can only conclude was the crime of speaking out about his fears of being repatriated. As Reprieve explained, “In a disgraceful show trial, the court sentenced Ahmed to 20 years in prison for belonging to an ‘overseas terrorist group.’ Despite repeated requests and extensive investigation, Reprieve’s lawyers have been unable to discover what exactly Ahmed is supposed to have done. No evidence has been produced to support his ‘conviction,’ which appears to be retaliation against Ahmed for speaking out about human rights abuses in Algeria.”

Human Rights Watch has stated that “Under Algerian law, Belbacha has the right to a new trial upon his return to Algeria,” but after his conviction in November it is unsurprising that Belbacha does not trust the Algerian government to treat him fairly if he is returned. As Reprieve noted, “He faces a lengthy illegal prison term, torture, and persecution if returned to Algeria.”

In an urgent appeal, Reprieve has called on the governments of Britain, Ireland and Luxembourg to offer Belbacha a new home. His lawyer, Tara Murray, stated:

We know from bitter experience that Guantánamo prisoners cannot trust “diplomatic assurances” from rights-abusing countries like Algeria, and the Obama Administration should have known better. The US has betrayed Abdul Aziz Naji and we are fighting to ensure that our client Ahmed Belbacha does not suffer the same fate. Algeria’s government has a clear grudge against Ahmed and cannot be trusted. Ahmed has repeatedly pleaded for help and we are running out of time. Will the governments of Luxembourg, Ireland and the UK hear his pleas?

Ahmed Belbacha’s appeal for the British government to offer him a new home is long-standing, as he lived and worked here for nearly two years from 1999 to 2001, when, with his asylum claim ongoing, he decided to take an ill-advised holiday in Pakistan. A resident in Bournemouth, where he lived, has offered him a room, but the British government has been so indifferent to his fate that Reprieve and other organizations, including Amnesty International and Cageprisoners, sought help from Ireland and Luxembourg as well. He has also been offered a home in Amherst, Massachusetts, although a law passed by Congress, banning any Guantánamo prisoners from being brought to the US mainland except to face a trial, has prevented him from taking up this offer.

Last week, the London Guantánamo Campaign prepared a letter to foreign secretary William Hague asking him to secure Mr. Belbacha’s return to the UK. A slightly amended version of this letter is posted below (which readers can cut and paste), but please feel free to change it as you see fit. The letter can be emailed to the foreign secretary (email address here), or sent to: William Hague MP, Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, King Charles Street, London, SW1A 2AH.

Dear Foreign Secretary,

I am writing to you as a matter of urgency, concerning the case of Ahmed Belbacha, a British resident who has been held at Guantánamo Bay for over eight years.

Mr. Belbacha is a 40-year old Algerian who lived in the UK for nearly two years, from 1999 to 2001, having fled Algeria where his life was at risk. While travelling in Pakistan, he was captured and taken to Guantánamo Bay. Cleared for release in 2007, he has chosen to remain at Guantánamo Bay, rather than face the risk to his life in Algeria. This risk was compounded in November 2009 when he was sentenced in absentia to 20 years in prison for “membership of a terrorist organisation overseas”. No evidence was produced to back this up.

On 17 July, a US Supreme Court ruling resulted in an Algerian national, Abdul Aziz Naji, being forcibly repatriated to Algeria, where he has been indicted on unspecified charges, and is subject to “judicial supervision”. His return, the first forced repatriation under the Obama administration, was strongly condemned by Human Rights Watch and the United Nations. There is a strong likelihood that in sending Mr. Naji back to Algeria, the US government has breached the principle of “non-refoulement” in the UN Convention Against Torture.

This ruling paves the way for the forced return of Ahmed Belbacha.

Mr. Belbacha’s return to the UK was not sought by the previous government. However, we maintain that, given his ties to this country, he should be allowed to return here on humanitarian grounds. Such a move would provide him with a safe haven, and act as a gesture of cooperation with the US in its efforts to find countries for prisoners who cannot be safely repatriated, thereby helping President Obama to close the prison. Several other European countries have taken this action, providing residence to non-nationals as a means of assisting the US.

I urge you to take urgent action for Ahmed Belbacha to ensure a safe end to his wholly illegal ordeal over the past eight years.

I look forward to your response,

Yours sincerely,

The London Guantánamo Campaign also recommended that supporters send the letter to their MP (find your local MP via TheyWorkForYou), and also to write to the Algerian Embassy and the Permanent Mission of Algeria at the United Nations, asking them not to accept the forced repatriation of prisoners who do not wish to return to Algeria, and to ensure that prisoners who are returned are treated fairly.

Andy Worthington is the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by Macmillan in the US, and available from Amazon — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to my RSS feed (and I can also be found on Facebook and Twitter). Also see my definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, updated in July 2010, details about the new documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (co-directed by Polly Nash and Andy Worthington, currently on tour in the UK, and available on DVD here), and my definitive Guantánamo habeas list, and, if you appreciate my work, feel free to make a donation.

Given that, in its 2009 report on human rights in Algeria, the US State Department noted, “Local human rights lawyers maintained that torture continued to occur in detention facilities, most often against those arrested on ‘security grounds’” it was not entirely reassuring that an Obama administration official told the Washington Post that the Algerian government had “provided diplomatic assurances” that prisoners returned from Guantánamo “would not be mistreated,” and added, “We take some care in evaluating countries for repatriation. In the case of Algeria, there is an established track record and we have given that a lot of weight. The Algerians have handled this pretty well: You don’t have recidivism and you don’t have torture.”

Following Naji’s transfer, Human Rights Watch and the Center for Constitutional Rights issued immediate press releases urging the Obama administration to recognize its international obligations, and warning that Naji had legitimate fears of both the Algerian government and of extremists who might prey on him, and on Wednesday Manfred Nowak, the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture, and Martin Scheinin, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Protection of Human Rights while Countering Terrorism, issued a statement drawing attention to the Supreme Court rulings that paved the way for the enforced transfer of Naji and another Algerian, Farhi Saeed bin Mohammed, who won his habeas corpus petition last November, but is still held.

Criticism of Obama and the Supreme Court by the UN and the New York Times

The UN experts stated, “We are extremely worried that the lives of two Algerian detainees could be put in danger without a proper assessment of the risks they could face if returned against their will to their country of origin. While we appreciate the efforts of the authorities to close the Guantánamo detention facility, the risk assessment should be a meaningful and fair process, and the courts should be part of it.” The experts also called into question the Obama administration’s reliance on diplomatic assurances that Naji — and bin Mohammed — would be treated humanely, stating, “Diplomatic assurances are unreliable or difficult to monitor,” and reiterating that they “cannot substitute the sending country’s obligation to assess the real risk facing the individual.”

Over the weekend, the New York Times became involved, noting, in a sternly worded editorial, that “A prisoner who begs to stay indefinitely at the Guantánamo Bay detention center rather than be sent back to Algeria probably has a strong reason to fear the welcoming reception at home,” reminding the Obama administration of Naji’s belief that “he would be tortured if he was transferred to Algeria, by either the Algerian government or fundamentalist groups there,” and criticizing the decision to forcibly repatriate him as “an act of cruelty that seems to defy explanation.”

The Times also noted that Naji had asked for political asylum in Switzerland, which Ellen Lubell, one of his lawyers, elaborated on at the weekend, telling supporters, “We had applied for asylum in Switzerland for Aziz and his application was proceeding through the Swiss courts with support from many in that country.” The Times also ran through the outline of Naji’s story, noting that he was “picked up by the police in Pakistan in May 2002 and turned over to the Americans on suspicion of being a terrorist,” and adding that, although he “admitted working for the humanitarian wing of Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Pakistani terrorist organization,” the Bush administration “never charged him with a crime, explained why he was being held, or demonstrated any connection to terrorist acts.”

Abdul Aziz Naji’s story

This was a fair précis of Naji’s case, although it is worth elaborating on in more detail. As the Center for Constitutional Rights explained (PDF), he was born in 1975 in Batna (about 300 miles east of Algiers), and, after completing his schooling, worked in his father’s blacksmith shop and then undertook his obligatory military service in the Algerian army. In early 2001, he traveled to Pakistan to provide humanitarian aid to Muslims and Christians in Kashmir, but one night, while carrying food and clothing to poor villagers with a group of other volunteers, he stepped on a landmine and sustained a serious injury, which led to the loss of his lower right leg.

After being treated in a hospital in Lahore, where he was fitted with a prosthetic leg, he was taken in by a few generous families while he recuperated, and was then recommended to visit an Algerian in Peshawar, near the Afghan border, who would be able to help him find a wife. While visiting this man in May 2002, he was seized in a raid by Pakistani police — one of many raids at the time that helped to fill Guantánamo — even though he was never told why he had been seized, and, in fact, was told by the Pakistanis who seized him that he would be released.

In Guantánamo, Naji told his interrogators that he was unaware that Lashkar-e-Taiba was affiliated with al-Qaeda, as the Americans alleged (which was understandable, as LeT’s humanitarian work was separate from its military operations), and was also obliged to counter an allegation that he had received de-mining training at an LeT camp, pointing out that the fact that he lost his leg after stepping on a mine made a mockery of the allegation, and explaining that it was something he had been forced to admit when he was tortured in the US prison at Bagram airbase after his capture. He also explained the meaning of jihad to a military review board that reviewed his case, telling the panel of three officers, “The jihad does not have to be a jihad where you fight. Jihad can be carrying food or helping others. It does not have to be fighting.”

The latest news from Algeria

After Naji’s return, there were alarming indications that the worst fears about the Algerian authorities had been confirmed, when the Associated Press reported that the state prosecutor’s office in Algiers had stated on Monday that Naji had been “indicted,” on unspecified grounds. It later transpired that this was not the case, and that, as Reuters explained, Naji had been reunited with his family after approximately a week in lawful detention (according to Algerian law, terror suspects can be held for up to 12 days before appearing in court). A judicial source “who did not want to be identified” told Reuters, “He is at home in Batna. He just needs to go every week to the local police station to sign a form.”

In a statement, the prosecutor’s office said Naji “was released after appearing before a judge on Sunday who placed him under judicial control — which means he has to report regularly to police pending a further decision on his case,” as Reuters described it. The statement also explained, “Contrary to what has been falsely reported, this person’s case has been dealt with in the most complete transparency and in respect for the law, whether in terms of procedure or the length of his detention.”

The Algerian government could still spring a surprise on Naji, by deciding to put him forward for a trial, but even if the authorities leave him unmolested, there is no guarantee that the extremists that Naji fears will do the same — and it remains deeply troubling that the Obama administration may still seek to forcibly repatriate four other Algerians, also cleared for release after the deliberations of the President’s interagency Guantánamo Review Task Force, who are also terrified of returning home, as the Washington Post explained three weeks ago in an article entitled, “Six detainees would rather stay at Guantánamo Bay than be returned to Algeria.”

Although administration officials conceded last week that they would “continue to examine each case individually before any repatriation,” noting that some officials “have expressed some concern about returning one of the Algerians [Ahmed Belbacha] who was sentenced to 20 years in prison in absentia” last year (for speaking out about his fears of repatriation), it now appears, as I explained last week, that there is “no obstacle to prevent the Obama administration from sending the other four Algerians home whenever it feels like it.”

The other Algerians who fear enforced repatriation from Guantánamo

From what I can ascertain, given that the Obama administration has not released details about the men cleared for release by the Guantánamo Review Task Force, these men are, in addition to Farhi Saeed bin Mohammed, Nabil Hadjarab (PDF), Motai Saib and Djamel Ameziane (PDF), who were all cleared for release by military review boards under the Bush administration, and who all have legitimate fears about returning to Algeria.

Last February, in an article entitled, “Guantánamo’s refugees,” I described Nabil Hadjarab, who was 22 years old when he was seized, as “a young Algerian from a broken home, with relatives in Lyon, who was only persuaded to travel to Afghanistan because he was caught in limbo between Algeria and France as his family disintegrated around him.” As Afghanistan descended into chaos following the US-led invasion in October 2001, Hadjarab, who had been living in Kabul and had then moved to the eastern city of Jalalabad, tried to flee across the mountains to Pakistan, but was wounded by a bomb and taken to a hospital in Jalalabad, where he was sold to US forces.

Returning Nabil Hadjarab to Algeria would be, to extend the New York Times’ comment about Abdul Aziz Naji, “an act of cruelty that seems to defy explanation,” because his extended family is in France, and is willing to take him in, and because he has almost no family connections in Algeria, making him particularly vulnerable to both the government and to extremists who might wish to prey on him. Given that a guard in Guantánamo described him as “a brilliant artist, a keen footballer, and a sweet kid,” it is apparent that the French government should offer him a home, as his lawyers at the legal action charity Reprieve have requested.

Motai Saib, who was 25 years old when he was seized crossing the Pakistani border, had also been living in Jalalabad, and had traveled to Afghanistan via France and London. As his lawyers noted in a court filing in July 2008 (PDF), in February 2008 the Department of Defense notified them that Saib “’has been approved to leave Guantánamo,’ but stated obliquely that ‘such a decision does not equate [to] a determination that your client is not an enemy combatant, nor does is it a determination that he does not pose a threat to the United States or its allies. I cannot provide you any information regarding when your client may be leaving Guantánamo as his departure is subject to ongoing discussions.” As Saib’s lawyers noted, “Saib has serious concerns that this ambiguous and damaging language will prevent his safe release from Guantánamo.”

Djamel Ameziane, who was 34 years old when he was seized crossing the Pakistani border, had also been living in Jalalabad. A Berber, he left Algeria in 1992 “in order to escape persecution and make a better life for himself,” and unsuccessfully sought asylum in Austria, where he worked legally for three years, becoming the top chef at an Italian restaurant in Vienna, until a new government clamped down on immigrants, and his work permit was denied without explanation. From there, he moved to Canada, where he obtained a temporary work permit and worked for an office supply company and for various restaurants in Montreal. In 2000, after five years in Canada, his asylum claim was denied, and, as his lawyers explained, “Fearful of being forcibly returned to Algeria, and with few options, [he] went to Afghanistan, where he could live freely without discrimination as a Muslim man, and where he would not fear deportation to Algeria.”

Ameziane fears returning to Algeria because of the stigma of Guantánamo and the instability in his hometown of Kabylie, where, as his lawyers explained, practicing Muslims are “targeted for arrests and detention by the government based solely on their religious practices” and “The stigma of having spent time at Guantánamo would alone be enough to put him at risk of being imprisoned if he is returned.”

Advice for President Obama

With the uproar over the return of Abdul Aziz Naji, the Obama administration must surely be having second thoughts about proceeding with further enforced repatriations to Algeria, and if any further encouragement is needed, senior officials should recall that, although there were periodic threats to stealthily repatriate Algerians against their will under the Bush administration (as I reported here), the Bush administration was aware of Algeria’s dubious human rights record, and refused to repatriate Algerians who believed that they faced the risk of torture.

I leave the final word of advice to the editors of the New York Times, who concluded their editorial on Sunday with the following words:

We support the administration’s efforts to close Guantánamo, and understand the concern that if there is a more heavily Republican Congress next year, doing so may become harder. That is no reason to deliver prisoners to governments that the United States considers hostile and that have a record of torture and lawlessness.

The government refuses to deport prisoners to Libya, Syria and other countries known for abuse. It could find a new home for the Algerians.

I doubt that we will hear anything about discussions taking place behind the scenes, but for the sake of President Obama’s credibility (and, sadly, that of the Supreme Court), I hope that discussions are ongoing regarding the return of Nabil Hadjarab to France, of Ahmed Belbacha to the UK (where he lived without incident for nearly two years), of Djamel Ameziane to either Austria or Canada, and of Farhi Saeed bin Mohammed and Motai Saib to countries where dubious “diplomatic assurances” are not required to ensure their welfare as refugees who have already lost over eight years of their lives for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Andy Worthington is the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by Macmillan in the US, and available from Amazon — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to my RSS feed (and I can also be found on Facebook and Twitter). Also see my definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, updated in July 2010, details about the new documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (co-directed by Polly Nash and Andy Worthington, currently on tour in the UK, and available on DVD here), and my definitive Guantánamo habeas list, and, if you appreciate my work, feel free to make a donation.

As published exclusively on Cageprisoners.

See the following for articles about the 142 prisoners released from Guantánamo from June 2007 to January 2009, and the 60 prisoners released from February 2009 to mid-July 2010, whose stories are covered in more detail than is available anywhere else –- either in print or on the Internet –- although many of them, of course, are also covered in The Guantánamo Files: June 2007 –- 2 Tunisians, 4 Yemenis (here, here and here); July 2007 –- 16 Saudis; August 2007 –- 1 Bahraini, 5 Afghans; September 2007 –- 16 Saudis; September 2007 –- 1 Mauritanian; September 2007 –- 1 Libyan, 1 Yemeni, 6 Afghans; November 2007 –- 3 Jordanians, 8 Afghans; November 2007 –- 14 Saudis; December 2007 –- 2 Sudanese; December 2007 –- 13 Afghans (here and here); December 2007 –- 3 British residents; December 2007 –- 10 Saudis; May 2008 –- 3 Sudanese, 1 Moroccan, 5 Afghans (here, here and here); July 2008 –- 2 Algerians; July 2008 –- 1 Qatari, 1 United Arab Emirati, 1 Afghan; August 2008 –- 2 Algerians; September 2008 –- 1 Pakistani, 2 Afghans (here and here); September 2008 –- 1 Sudanese, 1 Algerian; November 2008 –- 1 Kazakh, 1 Somali, 1 Tajik; November 2008 –- 2 Algerians; November 2008 –- 1 Yemeni (Salim Hamdan) repatriated to serve out the last month of his sentence; December 2008 –- 3 Bosnian Algerians; January 2009 –- 1 Afghan, 1 Algerian, 4 Iraqis; ; February 2009 — 1 British resident (Binyam Mohamed); May 2009 — 1 Bosnian Algerian (Lakhdar Boumediene); June 2009 — 1 Chadian (Mohammed El-Gharani), 4 Uighurs to Bermuda, 1 Iraqi, 3 Saudis (here and here); August 2009 — 1 Afghan (Mohamed Jawad), 2 Syrians to Portugal; September 2009 — 1 Yemeni, 2 Uzbeks to Ireland (here and here); October 2009 — 1 Kuwaiti, 1 prisoner of undisclosed nationality to Belgium; October 2009 — 6 Uighurs to Palau; November 2009 — 1 Bosnian Algerian to France, 1 unidentified Palestinian to Hungary, 2 Tunisians to Italian custody; December 2009 — 1 Kuwaiti (Fouad al-Rabiah); December 2009 — 2 Somalis, 4 Afghans, 6 Yemenis; January 2010 — 2 Algerians, 1 Uzbek to Switzerland, 1 Egyptian, 1 Azerbaijani and 1 Tunisian to Slovakia; February 2010 — 1 Egyptian, 1 Libyan, 1 Tunisian to Albania, 1 Palestinian to Spain; March 2010 — 1 Libyan, 2 unidentified prisoners to Georgia, 2 Uighurs to Switzerland; May 2010 — 1 Syrian to Bulgaria, 1 Yemeni to Spain; July 2010 — 1 Yemeni (Mohammed Hassan Odaini).

I’ll discuss the stories of Abd al-Nisr Mohammed Khantumani and Abdul Aziz Naji in a separate article, but for now the focus must be on the legal maneuvering that led to the repatriation of Abdul Aziz Naji, because, for the first time in Guantánamo’s history, a prisoner has been sent home against his will, even though Doris Tennant, one of his lawyers, told the Washington Post two weeks ago that he was “adamantly opposed to going back.” At the weekend, another of his lawyers, Ellen Lubell, told the Miami Herald that Naji “fears extremists will try to recruit him — associating him with Guantánamo — and will torture or kill him if he resists.” She added, “He has nothing against the Algerian government, but he fears that the government will be unable to protect him from Algerian extremists.” In a press release, the Center for Constitutional Rights explained that Naji “fled various forms of persecution in Algeria many years ago, including having been attacked by an extremist.” CCR also sounded a note of caution about how the Algerian government will receive Naji, stating, “we are deeply concerned that he will disappear into secret detention.”

These are valid concerns, as Algeria has a poor human rights record. Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the United Nations (PDF, pp. 108-9) regularly express concerns about the use of torture in Algeria, and in its 2009 report on human rights in Algeria, the US State Department noted, “Local human rights lawyers maintained that torture continued to occur in detention facilities, most often against those arrested on ‘security grounds.’”

In contrast, an Obama administration official, speaking anonymously, told the Washington Post two weeks ago, “We take some care in evaluating countries for repatriation. In the case of Algeria, there is an established track record and we have given that a lot of weight. The Algerians have handled this pretty well: You don’t have recidivism and you don’t have torture.” This was a bold statement to make, in light of the allegations made by NGOs and the UN, and concerns about torture or other ill-treatment were not diminished by a response to the news of Naji’s repatriation in Monday’s Washington Post, in which it was noted that “The government said that Algeria has provided diplomatic assurances that Naji would not be mistreated, assurances that administration officials say are credible because 10 other detainees have been returned to Algeria without incident.”

The problems with this statement concern the “diplomatic assurances,” and the claim that 10 men have been repatriated “without incident.” On the “diplomatic assurances,” Human Rights Watch explained in a press release that its own research “has shown that diplomatic assurances provided by receiving countries, which are legally unenforceable, do not provide an effective safeguard against torture and ill-treatment,” and, on the status of the 10 men returned, although there have been no allegations of torture, there has been very little information at all about the conditions in which they have been held, and what has emerged publicly is not reassuring, as it reveals both prolonged pre-trial detention, and calls for punitive sentences from the prosecutors. As I explained in January this year:

[F]rustratingly little is known about the eight Algerians repatriated from Guantánamo between July 2008 and January 2009, although one indication of how the Algerian justice system deals with returned Guantánamo prisoners was provided in November 2009, when the BBC reported that, 15 months after two of these men were repatriated, they had been acquitted after a trial in which the prosecutor had called for prison sentences of 20 years.

Alarmingly, despite Abdul Aziz Naji’s fear of being repatriated — and the fears of five other Algerians, as revealed by the Washington Post two weeks ago — his release was not only supported by the Obama administration, but also by the Supreme Court.

Judge Gladys Kessler takes on the D.C. Circuit Court – and the Supreme Court

The spur for a legal battle that has largely been taking place without the mainstream media paying much attention — and with an alarming reliance on secrecy — was a principled stand taken by Judge Gladys Kessler, of the District Court in Washington D.C., who, single-handedly, has been attempting to uphold the United States’ obligation, under the UN Convention Against Torture, not to “expel, return (‘refouler’) or extradite a person to another State where there are substantial grounds for believing that he would be in danger of being subjected to torture.”

In November, Judge Kessler granted the habeas corpus petition of Farhi Saeed bin Mohammed, a 49-year old Algerian, after concluding that the government’s supposed evidence relied almost entirely on unreliable confessions produced by Binyam Mohamed, a British resident who was subjected to torture in Pakistan, Morocco and at the CIA’s “Dark Prison” in Kabul from April 2002 to May 2004.

Six months after Judge Kessler delivered her ruling, with bin Mohammed still not released, his lawyers asked her “to order the government to carry out his release, but to bar his transfer to Algeria, where he fears persecution or even death from either the Algerian government or from armed terrorist groups there,” as SCOTUSblog described it. As a result of two depressing rulings in the Court of Appeals in Washington D.C. Circuit Court (the District Court), judges are not actually able to order the release of prisoners who have won their habeas petitions, and are not even supposed to interfere with the disposition of prisoners, whose fate, according to the Circuit Court, is entirely dependent on the whims of the Executive branch. Judge Kessler, however, was undeterred.

On June 3, she issued a temporary order barring bin Mohammed’s transfer to Algeria, and on June 10 mounted a stout defense of his right not to be forcibly repatriated, noting (PDF):

Petitioner has voiced great fear about being transferred to Algeria. He has not lived in Algeria for more than 20 years, and has no ties to that country. Because he has been designated an “enemy combatant,” he greatly fears retribution by the Algerian authorities and that he will be formally charged under the Algerian Penal Code, tortured, convicted, and very possibly executed by the Algerian Government. He has claimed that he will be caught between the Algerian Government, which will brand him as an international terrorist, and armed domestic terrorists, who oppose the existing government, often pressure individuals to join their ranks, and retaliate violently when such individuals refuse. Petitioner has made clear that he would rather suffer continued confinement in Guantánamo Bay than be placed in the control of the Algerian Government.

In response to a brief filed by the government, Judge Kessler complained that two declarations submitted, which purported to guarantee bin Mohammed’s humane treatment if returned to Algeria, “appear to be boilerplate statements which have been filed in a number of the Government’s Oppositions to Motions,” and that a third, written by Daniel Fried, President Obama’s Special Envoy on Guantánamo, “was submitted ex parte so that [bin Mohammed] has not had an opportunity to read it.” After noting that bin Mohammed’s fears “are of great concern,” and that it is “essential” that assurances received from the Algerian government, purporting to guarantee that bin Mohammed will receive “humane treatment,” are “tested,” Judge Kessler ordered Fried to appear in person in her court, explaining, “Given the centrality of those representations and assurances to the future of [bin Mohammed] and possibly to his very life, this Court has an obligation to ensure that there is real substance behind the conclusory phrases contained in Special Envoy Fried’s declarations.”

Fried never turned up, of course, because the Justice Department immediately filed an appeal with the Circuit Court, which then ordered Judge Kessler to “resolve all outstanding motions” in the case with reference to Munaf v. Geren and Kiyemba v. Obama (aka Kiyemba II), the cases that the Circuit Court had drawn on (Munaf) and issued (Kiyemba II) to demonstrate that only the Executive branch was entitled to make decisions about where to send Guantánamo prisoners. As SCOTUSblog noted, “While the order did not say that Kessler could not hold a hearing on Mohammed’s plea not to be sent to Algeria, it specified that the judge was to rule on that issue ‘without requiring testimony from Special Envoy Fried or any other United States government official,’” which, of course, “completely undercut the purpose that Kessler had” for calling the hearing in the first place.

The Circuit Court then issued an amended ruling, instructing Judge Kessler to decide the Mohammed plea “in an order from which a party can take an immediate appeal,” and as SCOTUSblog noted in response to this instruction:

The Circuit Court thus had taken over, in a significant way, the further proceedings in Kessler’s Court, and has sent her the strongest hint that she risked being overturned if she barred his transfer anew. Since it noted the binding nature of the precedents she was to observe, the Circuit Court clearly was signaling that, if it accepted the government’s view that Mohammed’s case was no different, Kessler would be found to be without authority to prevent his transfer to Algeria.

After this, the struggle between Judge Kessler and the Circuit Court was swamped in secrecy. At a hearing convened by Kessler on June 28, all the documentation was sealed, but SCOTUSblog was able to deduce, from a subsequent appeal filed by the government, that she had once more barred bin Mohammed’s transfer to Algeria. On July 8, however, in another secret hearing, the Circuit Court “summarily overturned” Judge Kessler’s ban, prompting SCOTUSblog to note that the court’s order “continues a seldom-interrupted string of rulings by the Circuit Court against detainees challenging their confinement or transfer,” which “contrasts with a majority of rulings by District Court judges upholding detainees’ challenges under federal habeas law.”

The final blow for bin Mohammed — and for those who, like Judge Kessler, had quaintly presumed that the “non-refoulement” requirement of the UN Convention Against Torture might actually mean something to the judiciary and the Executive branch — came last Friday, when, by 5 votes to 3, the Supreme Court sided with the Circuit Court. As SCOTUSblog noted, the ruling was “the first indication that the Supreme Court will not allow federal judges to interfere with government controls on who leaves or stays at Guantánamo Bay.”

Although three of the justices — Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor — dissented, noting that they “would grant the stay to afford the Court time to consider, in the ordinary course, important questions raised in this case and not resolved in Munaf v. Geren,” just a few hours later the Supreme Court unanimously approved the forced repatriation of Abdul Aziz Naji.

This was a bleak day for US justice, not only because it involved the Supreme Court blithely disregarding the UN Convention Against Torture’s “non-refoulement” obligation, joining in an unholy trinity with the D.C. Circuit Court and the Obama administration, but also because it brings to an abrupt, cruel, and — I believe — illegal conclusion a struggle to release prisoners without violating the UN Convention Against Torture, which, for the most part, was actually respected by the Bush administration.

The Bush administration’s record on not returning prisoners to torture

The long history of the authorities grappling with the “non-refoulement” obligation at Guantánamo began with the Uighurs, 22 Muslims from China’s oppressed Xinjiang province, who were mostly seized in Pakistan in December 2001 after crossing from Afghanistan, where they had been living in a run-down settlement in the Tora Bora mountains, thwarted in their attempts to travel to Turkey or Europe in search of work, or nursing futile hopes of rising up against their only enemy, the Chinese government.

With the Uighurs, the Bush administration recognized its “non-refoulement” obligation, refusing to return them to China, and finding new homes for five of the men in Albania in 2006. When the Obama administration inherited the problem of the remaining 17 men, who had, in the meantime, won their habeas corpus petitions, it found new homes for 12 of them in Bermuda, Palau and Switzerland, although five still remain at Guantánamo, and, last spring, the administration turned down a plan by White House Counsel Greg Craig to bring some of the men to live in the US, which would have done more in the long run to defuse scaremongering about Guantánamo than any other gesture.

Despite the Bush administration locating some principles when it came to the Uighurs, in other cases prisoners had to fight in the courts to prevent their forcible repatriation to countries where they faced the risk of torture. In 2007, a Libyan, Abdul Rauf al-Qassim, sought the intervention of the courts to prevent his return to Libya, and after two Tunisians were repatriated in June 2007 — and were subsequently mistreated and given jail sentences (of three and seven years) after show trials — a judge intervened to prevent the repatriation of a third, Mohammed Abdul Rahman (also known as Lotfi bin Ali), and, by extension, other Tunisians in Guantánamo.

In other cases, like that of Ahmed Belbacha, an Algerian who had lived in the UK, lawyers successfully sought injunctions preventing their return, and by the time Obama came to power, it was generally understood that prisoners were not be involuntarily returned to China, Egypt, Libya, Syria, Tunisia or Uzbekistan. As a result, in the last year, the Obama administration has resettled prisoners from Egypt, Libya, Syria, Tunisia and Uzbekistan in Albania, Belgium, Bulgaria, Georgia, Ireland, Portugal, Slovakia and Switzerland. Algeria was more problematical, as was demonstrated by the cases of the men who had returned voluntarily, even though there was, to be honest, no guarantee that they would be treated humanely, and my constant analogy was that return to Algeria was like Russian Roulette.

How the Circuit Court defended expansive executive power

However, all this came to an end with the Circuit Court’s intervention in the Uighurs’ case — firstly, in February 2009 (in Kiyemba v. Obama, aka Kiyemba I), when a panel of judges ruled that the courts could not order the resettlement in the US of prisoners who had won their habeas petitions but could not be repatriated, because only the Executive branch could decide matters relating to immigration. As I explained in a review of the ruling:

The judges were seemingly unmoved that this would leave the Uighurs (and, very possibly, others in Guantánamo) with no means of leaving the prison, and that it stripped the Supreme Court’s ruling in June 2008, granting the prisoners habeas corpus rights, of all practical meaning, if it was not possible for judges to order their release. In the judges’ words, however, “the political branches have the exclusive power … to decide which aliens may, and which aliens may not, enter the United States, and on what terms.”

The second blow came last September (in another Kiyemba v. Obama case, identified as Kiyemba II), after the Uighurs’ lawyers asked the Court of Appeals to reconsider its opinion en banc (in other words, with all the judges ruling, instead of just a panel of three), and also sought assurances that the courts would be able to act if the government proposed sending their clients to countries where they faced the risk of torture. However, as I explained at the time:

[N]ot only did the court refuse to reconsider its ruling, but the judges also refused the Uighurs’ request for the court’s assistance “to prevent their transfer to a country where they are likely to be subjected to further detention or to torture,”, drawing on Munaf v. Geren, a case from 2008 in which “two American citizens held in the custody of the United States military in Iraq petitioned for writs of habeas corpus, seeking to enjoin the Government from transferring them to Iraqi custody for criminal prosecution in the Iraqi courts.” In Munaf, although “The Court held the district court had jurisdiction over the petitions,” it also ruled that “it could not enjoin the Government from transferring the petitioners to Iraqi custody,” because “that concern is to be addressed by the political branches, not the judiciary.”

It is this narrow reading of Munaf that has particularly enraged those opposed to the Circuit Court’s resolute endorsement of executive power — and which at least caused some consternation last Friday to Justices Ginsburg, Breyer and Sotomayor. Essentially, though, the Circuit Court’s ruling in Kiyemba II dictates what happens to prisoners like Abdul Aziz Naji — and, presumably, Farhi Saeed bin Mohammed — when the administration tires of trying to find new homes for them, and decides to subject them involuntarily to the Russian Roulette repatriation package that Abdul Aziz Naji received this week.

Although government officials told the Washington Post on Monday that they “will nonetheless continue to examine each case individually before any repatriation,” noting that some officials “have expressed some concern about returning one of the Algerians [Ahmed Belbacha] who was sentenced to 20 years in prison in absentia” last year, for what his lawyers think was the crime of speaking out about his fears of repatriation, there now appears to be no obstacle to prevent the Obama administration from sending the other four Algerians home whenever it feels like it.

To discover that such shameless disregard for the UN Convention Against Torture has come not only from the Supreme Court, but also from the man who promised to close Guantánamo (but then failed to do so), and who also promised to uphold the absolute ban on torture (while refusing to prosecute anyone who authorized its use in the previous eight years), is depressing news indeed.

Note: With these releases, 178 prisoners remain at Guantánamo. One of these men, Ali Hamza al-Bahlul, is serving a life sentence in solitary confinement, after a one-sided trial by Military Commission in October 2008, in which he refused to mount a defense. Another prisoner, Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani, is in prison in New York, awaiting a federal court trial that was recently approved. 594 prisoners have been released (or, in some cases, transferred to the custody of their home governments, or of other governments), and six men died, five in mysterious circumstances.

Andy Worthington is the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by Macmillan in the US, and available from Amazon — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to my RSS feed (and I can also be found on Facebook and Twitter). Also see my definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, updated in July 2010, details about the new documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (co-directed by Polly Nash and Andy Worthington, currently on tour in the UK, and available on DVD here), and my definitive Guantánamo habeas list, and, if you appreciate my work, feel free to make a donation.

As published exclusively on Cageprisoners. Cross-posted on The Smirking Chimp, The Public Record and New Left Project.

See the following for articles about the 142 prisoners released from Guantánamo from June 2007 to January 2009, and the 60 prisoners released from February 2009 to mid-July 2010, whose stories are covered in more detail than is available anywhere else –- either in print or on the Internet –- although many of them, of course, are also covered in The Guantánamo Files: June 2007 –- 2 Tunisians, 4 Yemenis (here, here and here); July 2007 –- 16 Saudis; August 2007 –- 1 Bahraini, 5 Afghans; September 2007 –- 16 Saudis; September 2007 –- 1 Mauritanian; September 2007 –- 1 Libyan, 1 Yemeni, 6 Afghans; November 2007 –- 3 Jordanians, 8 Afghans; November 2007 –- 14 Saudis; December 2007 –- 2 Sudanese; December 2007 –- 13 Afghans (here and here); December 2007 –- 3 British residents; December 2007 –- 10 Saudis; May 2008 –- 3 Sudanese, 1 Moroccan, 5 Afghans (here, here and here); July 2008 –- 2 Algerians; July 2008 –- 1 Qatari, 1 United Arab Emirati, 1 Afghan; August 2008 –- 2 Algerians; September 2008 –- 1 Pakistani, 2 Afghans (here and here); September 2008 –- 1 Sudanese, 1 Algerian; November 2008 –- 1 Kazakh, 1 Somali, 1 Tajik; November 2008 –- 2 Algerians; November 2008 –- 1 Yemeni (Salim Hamdan) repatriated to serve out the last month of his sentence; December 2008 –- 3 Bosnian Algerians; January 2009 –- 1 Afghan, 1 Algerian, 4 Iraqis; ; February 2009 — 1 British resident (Binyam Mohamed); May 2009 — 1 Bosnian Algerian (Lakhdar Boumediene); June 2009 — 1 Chadian (Mohammed El-Gharani), 4 Uighurs to Bermuda, 1 Iraqi, 3 Saudis (here and here); August 2009 — 1 Afghan (Mohamed Jawad), 2 Syrians to Portugal; September 2009 — 1 Yemeni, 2 Uzbeks to Ireland (here and here); October 2009 — 1 Kuwaiti, 1 prisoner of undisclosed nationality to Belgium; October 2009 — 6 Uighurs to Palau; November 2009 — 1 Bosnian Algerian to France, 1 unidentified Palestinian to Hungary, 2 Tunisians to Italian custody; December 2009 — 1 Kuwaiti (Fouad al-Rabiah); December 2009 — 2 Somalis, 4 Afghans, 6 Yemenis; January 2010 — 2 Algerians, 1 Uzbek to Switzerland, 1 Egyptian, 1 Azerbaijani and 1 Tunisian to Slovakia; February 2010 — 1 Egyptian, 1 Libyan, 1 Tunisian to Albania, 1 Palestinian to Spain; March 2010 — 1 Libyan, 2 unidentified prisoners to Georgia, 2 Uighurs to Switzerland; May 2010 — 1 Syrian to Bulgaria, 1 Yemeni to Spain; July 2010 — 1 Yemeni (Mohammed Hassan Odaini).

Fighting ghosts: an interview with Husein Al-Samamara
By Frances Webber, Institute of Race Relations, July 1, 2010

Below we publish an interview with Husein Al-Samamara, currently subjected to draconian immigration bail conditions in the UK as he fights against his deportation to Jordan, where he was imprisoned and tortured.

Husein Al-Samamara was interviewed by Frances Webber in October 2009, but legal issues prevented publication. He recently decided to “go public” about his situation, and a filmed interview was shown on BBC’s Newsnight on 16 June 2010. He was facing revocation of his bail for that filmed interview. However, at a Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC) hearing, the judge ruled that he could remain on bail — on the ground that he did not wish to make a martyr of Al-Samamara.

Husein Al-Samamara: My name is Husein Al-Samamara. I am a Palestinian. I was born in Jordan, and I was there until I was 23 years old. Before that I’d been in trouble with the Jordanian authorities for talking against them in the mosque. I arrived in this country in May 2001 and claimed asylum straight away, at Heathrow airport. I was so scared of being sent back to Jordan, I gave false details — false name, false story, everything false except for my date of birth, because I didn’t want to say anything which would send me back to Jordan.

Frances Webber: When did your problems here start?

Husein Al-Samamara: My problems started in this country in 2004, when I was arrested under the Terrorism Act. I went to work as usual, and my manager said there were people who needed to speak to me in the main manager’s office. I went to the office, and I found two men in civilian clothes, and they said, “We’re police, you’re under arrest under the Terrorism Act.” I was so shocked, I asked, “What’s going on?” They said, “We have to handcuff you”. I said, “Listen, you don’t need to, people are going to look at me.” But then I looked through the window and there were about fifteen police cars in the car park. So I said, “OK, my workmates already know”, so I let them put these cuffs on. They took me to Halesowen police station, and started questioning me. They asked if I knew bin Laden. I said, “Yes, I know him, he’s on TV every day. He’s on the news all around the world.” They asked me about Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. He said al-Zarqawi came from the same city I came from. I said, “Does that mean I had to know him?” He said, “And he was in the same prison.” I said I’d never seen him and he wasn’t in the same prison.

[Mr Al-Samamara was questioned about a will and CDs found in his room in the house he shared with other asylum seekers.]

I was held in that police station for five days and released without any charge. Their questions showed that they knew who I was — they knew I wasn’t “Abdullah”, and they were asking about Jordan [not the West Bank, where Mr Al-Samamara had claimed to be from in his asylum claim]. So I realised that they must have got the information from the intelligence service in Jordan. What confirmed this was that a month after my release I went to sign on at the Home Office [as a refused asylum seeker] and found people waiting for me there. They said they need to speak to me. The older guy introduced himself as from MI5, and there was an Asian man and one woman from North Africa. They said, “Your name’s Husein, it’s not Abdullah.” I said, “OK”, and the older guy started questioning me again about Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. He started showing me photographs of myself taken in the GDI (secret service) building in Jordan. He told me, “We work together with the GDI.” He continued showing me photos, some taken in the same GDI building, some in the police station and some in prison in Jordan. He said he was sorry I had had a hard time in Jordan. I told him that what I lived through in Jordan, I wanted to forget, it was in the past, and I didn’t want anybody to be sorry for me. He was saying things like, “We can help you, we’re not asking you to do anything, just be good, be nice to us and we can help you. We can help you stay in this country.” I said that I didn’t need help from anyone. I wanted to be free of the whole situation I was in in Jordan. As I left the building, the Asian man said he needed to search the car. We went to the car park and he started searching the car. And the lady said, “Come on, just tell us, all the questions he asked you, is all that true?” I said I hadn’t said anything to him and I wasn’t going to say anything to her, there in the car park, just because she was a nice lady.

Frances Webber: By this time you’d been in the UK three years?

Husein Al-Samamara: I’d made many friends. Apart from these problems, things were OK. After my release I had gone back to work, and that was OK, I stayed there until December 2005, when I decided to leave to start my own business, which I did in January 2006, buying damaged cars, breaking them down for parts and sending them abroad. I bought a fork lift and a recovery truck, I passed my UK driving test and then started doing the truck licence. Until July 2006 … I’d met my wife in 2005 and we married in October. After we got married she moved from London to Birmingham. She came into this country to do her Masters degree, in Business Administration. After we married she left her studies. We decided just to have a family life.

On 13 July 2006 our first baby, a daughter, was born. I was in the hospital during the birth. And then I had a call from a police station in Birmingham, telling me they needed me to go in and make a statement about an incident I had reported to them where someone sold me fake insurance for my car. So I said, “OK, I’m in the hospital now, and my wife just gave birth. I’ll come tomorrow”, which was Friday. The officer went silent for a second, and then said, “You know what, just come in Monday [17 July].”

So Monday, I did a small party for my baby girl. She was just three days old at the time. The appointment with the officer was at 5pm. I called before I went, and asked if it was going to take long because we’re having a party. He said, “Just ten minutes maximum.” A friend drove me down and I said, “Stay in the car, I’m not going to be long, ten minutes.” I went inside the police station where the officer was waiting for me. He put me in a small room and said, “Just give me two minutes, I’ll be back.” He went outside, then he came back with something like ten officers, all wearing like helmets, and he said to me, “You are under arrest, your asylum claim has been refused and you’re going to be deported back to your home country.” That was it. They never asked me any questions. I asked if I could speak to my lawyer, they said, “We will inform your lawyer.” I said, “OK, can I speak to my wife?” They said, “No, not now, later on.” So they took me to a cell. The next morning, they said if you want to speak to your wife you can, but only in English. I said, “But I speak Arabic, she speaks Arabic, why do I have to speak in English with her?” They said, “You have to, otherwise you don’t speak to her.” So I spoke to my wife. She gave birth by caesarean, she wasn’t really well. I told her, “Don’t worry, it’s just an immigration problem.”

They transferred me from the police station to Long Lartin high security prison. There I realised I was not in a detention centre. I’d never been in prison [in the UK], and I was aware that if you have immigration problems you go to detention, not a prison. There were eighteen detainees — I was told later the unit was just opened for us, after being closed for fifteen years. They started telling me about SIAC [the Special Immigration Appeals Commission], secret evidence, and all that, and I didn’t believe them. I said, “That’s rubbish, what secret?” and they said, “Yeah, you’re going to be here for a long time, don’t worry.” They were laughing at me. So I called my solicitor, I remember the first time she explained to me about SIAC, and secret evidence, and she said, “I’ll try to get you out, but … ” I was in shock. For the first six, seven months I was still having a hope that this was wrong, and I was going to be released. But after that, you know …

[Bail was refused by SIAC in December 2006 and July 2007, on the basis of “closed” evidence, despite the judges accepting that Mr Al-Samamara's imprisonment was severely affecting his wife and baby daughter.]

I spent two years in Long Lartin. After Abu Qatada won his case in the Court of Appeal, because he’s Jordanian, the same as me, the court contacted my solicitors and told them to apply for bail.

Frances Webber: Were you released straight away?

Husein Al-Samamara: The Home Office said they didn’t need any surety. But the court said, “No, we need a surety.” Mr Mitting [the chairman of SIAC] said he wanted my friend, who had offered before. My friend was in Pakistan. The judge said, “That’s fine, just send him a fax to sign.” He was in a village, and he had to travel to a place where they had a fax. When he went there the electricity was down, so he had to go back again and he had to do the same again. It was very difficult. But in the end he got the statement, signed it and faxed it back.

Then the Home Office wouldn’t let me go back to the flat where I used to live. They said they were looking for a house for me. I waited [in prison] for nearly two months for the Home Office to come up with a place. [Mr Al-Samamara's lawyers went to court over the Home Office' continuing failure to find alternative accommodation for him to enable him to be released.] The judge gave them one week, and they came up with the house where I was rehoused.

That place was completely isolated. I’d lived in Birmingham for five years before I got arrested, but I never saw that area before. The Home Office lied, they said the house had got access to a halal butcher and a mosque. They pointed these two places out on a map. We went there. My solicitor went before me and she was looking for this mosque and this halal butcher and she couldn’t find either. She said probably I’m unfamiliar with the area, we’ll look again. So I got released and moved to that house. It was completely isolated. There were no Asian people at all in that area, which is fine, but it wasn’t that nice. There were so many racist incidents. My wife was attacked in that area.

[In one incident Mrs Al-Samamara took her daughter to the swings and white mothers immediately removed their children from the swings.]

Frances Webber: Why did they do that?

Husein Al-Samamara: Because her face is covered. She wears the veil. She used to get sworn at in the street, every single day. One time, I was in the hospital for an operation on my thigh, and she had to go out to get some bread and some stuff. She went with our daughter. On the way back, in the alleyway leading from the main street to where I live, a white man stopped her and was swearing at her and calling her names, and he was in a position to attack her, and she had a mobile in her pocket and she called the police. The man left.

Another time, we were physically assaulted. I went out with my wife and daughter, in the two hours I have, just to have a walk on a sunny nice day.

Outside the Select and Save shop, which is the only shop we have in the area, there were three men and they started calling my wife names. To be perfectly honest, I ignored them as I didn’t want to get into trouble because of my situation. I went into the shop to get bread, but they were still calling my wife names, she was in the car with our daughter. So I said, “Just have some respect. What’s wrong with you, you’re calling a lady names?” And then one of them just pushed me and swore at me. So I held him by the hand. Another man came from behind, and he punched me, and another one came at me, just attacked me with a stun gun. I fell onto the ground and my head hit the pavement. I just was stunned for a few seconds. I woke and my wife was screaming, crying, my daughter was crying.

[The racial abuse and attacks were so bad that the police told Mr Al-Samamara to carry a mobile phone on him at all times to report the incidents, unaware of the fact that he was not allowed one. Mr Al-Samamara's lawyers went to court for an order for the Home Office to rehouse them, but it was refused.]

Before this attack happened, I had been reporting every single incident [of racist abuse] to the police and to the Home Office. We’d been trying, asking them, pressing them, saying, “This is what we’ve been through.” But the Home Office had refused to move me from that area. But straightaway after that last incident the police informed the Home Office that they had to move me immediately.

[Eventually Mr Al-Samamara was moved out of Birmingham. He currently lives in a multi-racial area of London with his wife, daughter and infant son.]

Frances Webber: How do the bail conditions affect you?

Husein Al-Samamara: The conditions are so hard, to be honest, it’s not for a human being. I’m only allowed out for two hours in the morning and two hours in the afternoon. Then, I’m not allowed to go anywhere I want. It’s only within a certain area the Home Office give me. I can’t cross the boundary, that would be a breach of bail. I have to wear a [electronic] tag twenty-four hours a day. I have to sleep with it, I have to live with it, I have to walk with it. I have to report [to the security company] when I leave the house and when I come back. And I’m not allowed to have a mobile phone, I’m not allowed to have a computer, I’m not allowed to have anything which can be called a storage device, anything you can record on, I’m not allowed to have in the house. I’m not allowed to have a camera, I’m not allowed to have visitors unless they apply for clearance from the Home Office — even doctors.

My wife got ill, she got really mentally ill, and the doctors and the nurses needed to come to see her regularly. But they were rejected by the Home Office unless they applied for clearance. And these people were shocked, to be asked to give their personal details. They said, “But we are doctors.” Just today it happened again. My solicitor contacted me in the morning, because we asked the midwife to come, as my wife has just given birth recently, and again, the Home Office replied today saying no, they have to apply individually for clearance, and give their personal details. So these are the conditions I’ve lived under for nearly one and a half years, since my release, July 2008. The only visitors I’m allowed to have regularly, without clearance, are the police — and they come every couple of days and search the house, upside down, they go through everything.

Frances Webber: Have you any idea how long this is going to go on?

Husein Al-Samamara: I have no idea, to be honest with you. The case I’m fighting, it’s like I’m fighting a ghost. I don’t know what I’m fighting. Everything is secret. I’m not allowed to see anything. The evidence they say they have against me is held in secret.

[The Home Office asserted that Mr Al-Samamara had undertaken terrorist training in Afghanistan, associated with Islamist extremists in the UK and overseas, and had links with al-Zarqawi, but refused to provide any particulars or evidence, and SIAC upheld the refusal.]

Frances Webber: In your appeal against deportation, which SIAC rejected, they were talking about material that was found in your 2004 arrest, weren’t they? They were talking about this will.

Husein Al-Samamara: This will I wrote when I was in prison in Jordan, and I wasn’t hiding that will anyway. I just had it on the shelf. When they raided my house in 2004 they found it. And they were also talking about the CD-Roms, which they said were in my room in the house [in 2004]. They said they were some al-Qaida manual. I never saw them but this is what they said was on them. I said these were not mine, I didn’t even have a computer then.

Frances Webber: But you were questioned about both items in 2004 and released without charge.

Husein Al-Samamara: Yes. This is the only thing they told me about in the open. If there was any other evidence, it was secret.

Frances Webber: So what’s happened to your case since? Because that was about a couple of years ago.

Husein Al-Samamara: Yes, nearly two and a half years ago now. Since then, nothing, except these terrible conditions. I’m still living under these conditions. I appealed to the Court of Appeal, and I’ve been waiting all this time for a hearing. Until just yesterday [19 October 2009], I had a hearing in the Court of Appeal about the grounds.

Frances Webber: In Abu Qatada’s case, and in your case, I think SIAC accepted that people accused of terrorism in Jordan were tortured systematically –

Husein Al-Samamara: Yes, by the GDI.

Frances Webber: But why did they still say that you could go back to Jordan?

Husein Al-Samamara: I have no idea. They said, “We are promised by the Jordanians that they won’t torture you”, and on that assurance SIAC said, “You can go back.”

Frances Webber: So you’re waiting to hear from the Court of Appeal, and in the meantime you’re still living under these conditions. How has your life, your wife’s life been affected by living like this?

Husein Al-Samamara: My family life, my wife and daughter, have been affected so badly. Recently my wife spent nearly two months in the hospital. She’s got really mentally ill, she’s got agoraphobia now, she can’t go out at all now, unless if I go with her. This is how badly it’s affecting my wife. She was released from hospital about a month ago but she’s still bad, and the mental health team have visited her, for the first two weeks every day, now twice a week. We have to go to the hospital once every two weeks to be seen by the senior doctor, because of her problems.

Frances Webber: And before all of this started, what sort of person was she?

Husein Al-Samamara: She was a very, very active woman, she used to be happy, and when I started that business with the cars, she used to be cooking, cleaning the house, and even helped me in the car business. She used to do work on the computer …

Frances Webber: Do you think your daughter has been affected?

Husein Al-Samamara: Absolutely. I’m really close to my daughter. After I was released, I have built up a good relationship with her. Recently, a friend of my wife took her to her house to play. I called my wife’s friend and I asked her to give me my daughter to speak to her on the phone. And she just wouldn’t, she was crying, “I don’t want to speak, I don’t want to go back, I don’t want to go back.” She didn’t want to come back to the flat. Sometimes she wants me to take her out and I can’t because of the curfew. She’s only three and a half, she doesn’t understand why I can’t take her out. Sometimes she says, “I need to have some crisps, I need to have some drink, take me to the shop.” I say, “I can’t.” We Muslims say inshallah, that means, “If God wills it.” She starts hating that word, every time I say, “We’ll do it tomorrow, inshallah”, she says, “No, don’t inshallah, no inshallah.” She doesn’t understand even what inshallah means, but she knows that when I say it, it means there are going to be delays, it’s going to be tomorrow. So this is how bad it is. It’s affecting the whole family. And me personally, but I’m trying to show them I’m strong, I’m OK.

Frances Webber: One of the things you’ve done to keep your own sanity and strength is building with your matchsticks. Tell us a bit about that.

Husein Al-Samamara: Yes. I never thought in my life I would do anything like build with matchsticks. When I was in Long Lartin for the first time in my life I saw people doing this, building with matchsticks, so I started doing these projects, just to keep my brain occupied, and I really enjoyed it. I managed to do a jewellery box first, for my wife, then I did the mosque for her. Then I did the boat, and the boat and the mosque were exhibited last year. The boat was sold at an auction, and I gave the money to the charity who exhibited them.

[In a glass display case is a beautiful mosque, with a central dome, pillared courtyards and four minarets, made entirely from matchsticks (see photo above). Another of Mr Al-Samamara's matchstick creations, a traditional sailing boat with a curved prow, was sold at a Cageprisoners auction for £3,000.]

Andy Worthington is the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by Macmillan in the US, and available from Amazon — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to my RSS feed (and I can also be found on Facebook and Twitter). Also see my definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, updated in January 2010, details about the new documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (co-directed by Polly Nash and Andy Worthington, currently on tour in the UK, and available on DVD here), and my definitive Guantánamo habeas list, and, if you appreciate my work, feel free to make a donation.

For other articles dealing with Belmarsh, control orders, deportation bail, deportations and extraditions, see Deals with dictators undermined by British request for return of five Guantánamo detainees (August 2007), Britain’s Guantánamo: the troubling tale of Tunisian Belmarsh detainee Hedi Boudhiba, extradited, cleared and abandoned in Spain (August 2007), Guantánamo as house arrest: Britain’s law lords capitulate on control orders (November 2007), The Guantánamo Britons and Spain’s dubious extradition request (December 2007), Britain’s Guantánamo: control orders renewed, as one suspect is freed (February 2008), Spanish drop “inhuman” extradition request for Guantánamo Britons (March 2008), UK government deports 60 Iraqi Kurds; no one notices (March 2008), Repatriation as Russian Roulette: Will the Two Algerians Freed from Guantánamo Be Treated Fairly? (July 2008), Abu Qatada: Law Lords and Government Endorse Torture (February 2009), Ex-Guantánamo prisoner refused entry into UK, held in deportation centre (February 2009), Home Secretary ignores Court decision, kidnaps bailed men and imprisons them in Belmarsh (February 2009), Britain’s insane secret terror evidence (March 2009), Torture taints all our lives (published in the Guardian’s Comment is free), Britain’s Guantánamo: Calling For An End To Secret Evidence, Five Stories From Britain’s Guantánamo: (1) Detainee Y, Five Stories From Britain’s Guantánamo: (2) Detainee BB, Five Stories From Britain’s Guantánamo: (3) Detainee U, Five Stories From Britain’s Guantánamo: (4) Hussain Al-Samamara, Five Stories From Britain’s Guantánamo: (5) Detainee Z, Britain’s Guantánamo: Fact or Fiction? (all April 2009), Taking liberties with our justice system and Death in Libya, betrayal in the West (both for the Guardian), Law Lords Condemn UK’s Use of Secret Evidence And Control Orders (June 2009), Miliband Shows Leadership, Reveals Nothing About Torture To Parliamentary Committee (June 2009), Britain’s Torture Troubles: What Tony Blair Knew (June 2009), Seven years of madness: the harrowing tale of Mahmoud Abu Rideh and Britain’s anti-terror laws, Would you be able to cope?: Letters by the children of control order detainee Mahmoud Abu Rideh, Control order detainee Mahmoud Abu Rideh to be allowed to leave the UK (all June 2009), Testing control orders and Dismantle the secret state (for the Guardian), UK government issues travel document to control order detainee Mahmoud Abu Rideh after horrific suicide attempt (July 2009), Secret evidence in the case of the North West 10 “terror suspects” (August 2009), Letting go of control orders (for the Guardian, September 2009), Another Blow To Britain’s Crumbling Control Order Regime (September 2009), UK Judge Approves Use of Secret Evidence in Guantánamo Case (November 2009), Calling Time On The Use Of Secret Evidence In The UK (December 2009), Compensation for control orders is a distraction (for the Guardian, January 2010), Control Orders Take Another Blow: Libyan Cartoonist Freed (Detainee DD) (January 2010), Control Orders: Solicitors’ Evidence before the Joint Committee on Human Rights, February 3, 2010 and Control Orders: Special Advocates’ Evidence before the Joint Committee on Human Rights, February 3, 2010 (both February 2010), Will Parliament Rid Us of the Cruel and Unjust Control Order Regime? (February 2010), Don’t renew control orders, CAMPACC, JUSTICE and the Joint Committee on Human Rights tell MPs (February 2010), Fahad Hashmi and Terrorist Hysteria in US Courts (April 2010), 98 MPs Who Supported Human Rights While Countering Terrorism (May 2010), UK Terror Ruling Provides Urgent Test for New Government (May 2010), An uncivilized society (in the Guardian), New letter to MPs asking them to oppose the use of secret evidence in UK courts, and to support the return from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer (May 2010), Torture Complicity Under the Spotlight in Europe (Part One): The UK (July 2010).

Like a few dozen other terror suspects — both British and foreign nationals — who are confined to their homes for up to 18 hours a day on control orders or deportation bail, Mr. Alsamamara is held on the basis of secret evidence that has not been fully disclosed to him, and deprived of his liberty without being charged or tried. As the BBC explained, “Mr. Alsamamara is tagged, must stay inside his house for 18 hours a day, and when he leaves he can only travel a couple of miles from his home in a legally delineated zone. He cannot meet people without prior approval from the home secretary, has no access to the internet and has one fixed telephone line which is likely to be monitored.”

Mr. Alsamamara finds the restrictions on his liberty so intolerable that, over the last six months, he allowed two independent filmmakers, Gemma Atkinson and Fred Grace of Fat Rat Films, to film him at his home, and to pass the footage on to the BBC. In the film, Mr. Alsamamara explains his despair, telling the filmmakers, “My wife and my daughter and my new born son, they become prisoners with me in the house. Now my wife she is mentally ill and this is a result of my situation.” He also appeals for justice, asking, “If they believe that I’m a threat to the national security and if they have evidence to prove that I’m a threat to the national security, why don’t they put me on an open trial?”

However, by agreeing to be filmed, Mr. Alsamamara broke his strict bail conditions, and may be sent back to prison by the Special Immigration Appeals Commissions (SIAC), the special court that deals with terror suspects and deportation issues, which is meeting today to discuss his case.

What is he supposed to have done?

In common with the majority of the men held on the basis of secret evidence, Mr. Alsamamara is not entirely clear about why he is regarded as a terror suspect. As the BBC explained, “The government says Mr. Alsamamara is a committed Islamist extremist and a danger to Britain.” However, “Almost all of the evidence against him is thought to be intelligence material which neither he nor his lawyers have seen.”

What is clear is that he was an opponent of the Jordanian government, who was tortured in Jordanian custody. In 2001, he fled to Britain and claimed asylum. His claim was rejected, and in 2004, when his daughter was just four days old, and he and his family were having a gathering at home to celebrate the birth, he was seized by police and taken to Long Lartin prison, pending deportation to Jordan.

According to the BBC, “The Jordanian intelligence department has told the British government it wants to question him in relation to alleged contact with the former leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, and over claims that he underwent paramilitary training in Afghanistan.” In response, Mr. Alsamamara “denies any links with terrorism and says he faces torture if he is returned.”

Seeking information about the supposed evidence against Mr. Alsamamara, the BBC explained that “Very little is in the public domain but some indications are given in a document published in 2007 by the Special Immigration Appeals Commission,” which, at the time, “dismissed his appeal against deportation, largely on the basis of secret intelligence which was excluded from Mr. Alsamamara and his lawyers.”

“However,” the BBC explained, “SIAC’s judgment does refer to two open strands of evidence. Police found two CDs in a rack on his bedroom floor when they searched his house in 2004. The contents were discussed in closed sessions so we cannot be sure what was on these CDs, but it is likely to be propaganda material.”

Mr. Alsamamara “denies any knowledge of these CDs,” and also, crucially, takes exception to what appears to be another key element of the government’s supposed evidence — a will, found in an envelope on a notice-board, which, according to SIAC, was written in “lurid terms,” and “includes references to ‘jihad’ and records his wish ‘to slaughter’ members of the Jordanian government and the police.” As the BBC explained, Mr. Alsamamara “does not deny writing this will but argues it simply quotes from the Qur’an and the hadiths, and it reflects his natural hatred of the Jordanian authorities who tortured him in the past,” but SIAC disagreed, stating, “This is the will of an Islamist extremist … it is a declaration by an Islamist extremist that he wishes, if possible, to meet his fate in fighting the enemies of Islam.”

As the BBC pointed out, however, “beyond the question of whether Mr. Alsamamara is a committed Islamist extremist or not lie a number of difficult issues”; namely, “Even if he were planning jihadi action against the rulers of Jordan, does that constitute a threat to the UK? And is it ever justifiable to effectively detain someone when they know virtually nothing about the case against them?”

That last question leads on, I think, to the most important question of all: will the new coalition government take the advice of legal experts (see this PDF) and allow the use of intercept evidence in courts? Unless the government follows this route, this absurd travesty of justice — as exposed through this week’s insight into Hussain Alsamamara’s life — will not be brought to an end, even though terror suspects, like any other criminal suspect, ought to be charged and tried, so that we can finally move beyond a system in which, under the guise of “national security,” we are holding men without charge or trial, and persecuting their wives and children, on the basis of evidence that is little more than the untested claims of prosecutors, the police and the security services.

Note: For the next week, the Newsnight feature on Hussain Alsamamara is available on iPlayer. The main film is here (7:12), and also see this other short film (2:13), this live interview with Mr. Alsamamara, conducted by Gavin Esler (1:55), and this debate about house arrest, deportation and secret evidence (8:13), featuring Sir Brian Barder, who worked for SIAC from 1997 to 2004, and is critical of any system of detention that deprives suspects of a trial, former Home Office minister Tony McNulty, and Dr. Usama Hasan from the Leyton Mosque. Also see No Place Like Home, the website for the forthcoming documentary by Gemma Atkinson and Fred Grace, this transcript of a statement made by Mr. Alsamamara last March, which was read out by an actor during a meeting about secret evidence in the House of Commons, convened by Diane Abbott MP, and this short film of an actor reading out the transcript, which was part of the Guardian’s “Slow Torture” series about secret evidence last summer.

POSTSCRIPT 3 pm: The ever-alert David Mery has just written to tell me that, in the SIAC hearing today, Judge Mitting decided not to revoke Hussain’s bail nor to increase his bail conditions (his main reason being “not to sacrifice your wife and children.”) He added, however, that Gemma Atkinson and Fred Grace, the filmmakers, may be in contempt of court. Please also see this photo by David of where SIAC conducts its business — yes, in a windowless room behind a bland door marked “Basement”!

Andy Worthington is the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by Macmillan in the US, and available from Amazon — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to my RSS feed (and I can also be found on Facebook and Twitter). Also see my definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, updated in January 2010, details about the new documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (co-directed by Polly Nash and Andy Worthington, currently on tour in the UK, and available on DVD here), and my definitive Guantánamo habeas list, and, if you appreciate my work, feel free to make a donation.

For other articles dealing with Belmarsh, control orders, deportation bail, deportations and extraditions, see Deals with dictators undermined by British request for return of five Guantánamo detainees (August 2007), Britain’s Guantánamo: the troubling tale of Tunisian Belmarsh detainee Hedi Boudhiba, extradited, cleared and abandoned in Spain (August 2007), Guantánamo as house arrest: Britain’s law lords capitulate on control orders (November 2007), The Guantánamo Britons and Spain’s dubious extradition request (December 2007), Britain’s Guantánamo: control orders renewed, as one suspect is freed (February 2008), Spanish drop “inhuman” extradition request for Guantánamo Britons (March 2008), UK government deports 60 Iraqi Kurds; no one notices (March 2008), Repatriation as Russian Roulette: Will the Two Algerians Freed from Guantánamo Be Treated Fairly? (July 2008), Abu Qatada: Law Lords and Government Endorse Torture (February 2009), Ex-Guantánamo prisoner refused entry into UK, held in deportation centre (February 2009), Home Secretary ignores Court decision, kidnaps bailed men and imprisons them in Belmarsh (February 2009), Britain’s insane secret terror evidence (March 2009), Torture taints all our lives (published in the Guardian’s Comment is free), Britain’s Guantánamo: Calling For An End To Secret Evidence, Five Stories From Britain’s Guantánamo: (1) Detainee Y, Five Stories From Britain’s Guantánamo: (2) Detainee BB, Five Stories From Britain’s Guantánamo: (3) Detainee U, Five Stories From Britain’s Guantánamo: (4) Hussain Al-Samamara, Five Stories From Britain’s Guantánamo: (5) Detainee Z, Britain’s Guantánamo: Fact or Fiction? (all April 2009), Taking liberties with our justice system and Death in Libya, betrayal in the West (both for the Guardian), Law Lords Condemn UK’s Use of Secret Evidence And Control Orders (June 2009), Miliband Shows Leadership, Reveals Nothing About Torture To Parliamentary Committee (June 2009), Britain’s Torture Troubles: What Tony Blair Knew (June 2009), Seven years of madness: the harrowing tale of Mahmoud Abu Rideh and Britain’s anti-terror laws, Would you be able to cope?: Letters by the children of control order detainee Mahmoud Abu Rideh, Control order detainee Mahmoud Abu Rideh to be allowed to leave the UK (all June 2009), Testing control orders and Dismantle the secret state (for the Guardian), UK government issues travel document to control order detainee Mahmoud Abu Rideh after horrific suicide attempt (July 2009), Secret evidence in the case of the North West 10 “terror suspects” (August 2009), Letting go of control orders (for the Guardian, September 2009), Another Blow To Britain’s Crumbling Control Order Regime (September 2009), UK Judge Approves Use of Secret Evidence in Guantánamo Case (November 2009), Calling Time On The Use Of Secret Evidence In The UK (December 2009), Compensation for control orders is a distraction (for the Guardian, January 2010), Control Orders Take Another Blow: Libyan Cartoonist Freed (Detainee DD) (January 2010), Control Orders: Solicitors’ Evidence before the Joint Committee on Human Rights, February 3, 2010 and Control Orders: Special Advocates’ Evidence before the Joint Committee on Human Rights, February 3, 2010 (both February 2010), Will Parliament Rid Us of the Cruel and Unjust Control Order Regime? (February 2010), Don’t renew control orders, CAMPACC, JUSTICE and the Joint Committee on Human Rights tell MPs (February 2010), Fahad Hashmi and Terrorist Hysteria in US Courts (April 2010), 98 MPs Who Supported Human Rights While Countering Terrorism (May 2010), UK Terror Ruling Provides Urgent Test for New Government (May 2010), An uncivilized society (in the Guardian), New letter to MPs asking them to oppose the use of secret evidence in UK courts, and to support the return from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer (May 2010).

I do, however, urge everyone to read the whole report, because the introduction and conclusions are important, as are the sections establishing the legal approach to secret detention and its historical context, the section detailing current practices in 25 other countries worldwide, and the annexes, which contain government responses to a questionnaire about secret detention, and a number of case studies.

Given the length of this section of the report (pp. 43-89), I’m publishing it in three parts. The first, published here, provided an introduction, and dealt with “The ‘high-value detainee’ programme and CIA secret detention facilities,” the second looked at “CIA detention facilities or facilities operated jointly with United States military in battlefield zones,” and the third, published below, looks at “Proxy detention sites,” “Complicity in the practice of secret detention” and “Secret detention and the Obama administration.”

Please note that I have inserted hyperlinks where possible. However, the original report contains footnotes, and not all of these provide links to websites. In most cases, I have added the information contained in the footnotes in square brackets, but for full details, please see the original.

Excerpts from the UN “Joint Study on Global Practices in Relation to Secret Detention in the Context of Counter-Terrorism,” February 2010

Prepared by Martin Scheinin, the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms while countering terrorism, Manfred Nowak, the Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, Shaheen Ali, the vice-chair of the Working Group on arbitrary detention, and Jeremy Sarkin, the chair of the Working Group on enforced or involuntary disappearances.

C.  Proxy detention sites

141. Since 2005, details have emerged of how the United States was not only secretly capturing, transferring and detaining people itself, but also transferring people to other States for the purpose of interrogation or detention without charge. The practice had apparently started almost simultaneously with the high-value detainee programme. The British Government transmitted to the experts a summary of conclusions and recommendations of the Intelligence and Security Committee report on rendition (2007), in which it was noted that “the Security Service and SIS were … slow to detect the emerging pattern of “renditions to detention” that occurred during 2002” [The summary was sent in response to a questionnaire on allegations of rendition and detention sent by the Working Group on Enforced and Involuntary Disappearances, dated 8 July 2009]. The CIA appears to have been generally involved in the capture and transfer of prisoners, as well as in providing questions for those held in foreign prisons. Beyond that, a clear pattern is difficult to discern: some prisoners were subsequently returned to CIA custody (and were  generally sent on to Guantanamo), while others were sent back to their home countries, or remained in the custody of the authorities in third countries.

142. The Government of the United States has acknowledged that “some enemy combatants have been transferred to their countries of nationality for continued detention” [E/CN.4/2004/3, para. 69]. In its report to the Committee against Torture on 13 January 2006, the Government attempted to deflect criticism of its policy of sending detainees to countries with poor human rights records, including those where they might face the risk of torture, declaring that “the United States does not transfer persons to countries where the United States believes it is ‘more likely than not’ that they will be tortured … The United States obtains assurances, as appropriate, from the foreign government to which a detainee is transferred that it will not torture the individual being transferred” [CAT/C/48/Add.3/Rev.1, para. 30. See also the reply of the Government to a general allegation regarding the its involvement in one case of extraordinary rendition transmitted by the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances, in which it affirmed that “the United States does not transport individuals from one country to another for the purpose of interrogation using torture. Furthermore, the United States has not transported individuals, and will not transport individuals to a country where the Government believes they will be tortured” (A/HRC/10/9, para. 425)]. Various United Nations bodies, including the experts and the Committee against Torture, have criticized heavily this policy of “extraordinary rendition” in a detailed way in the past, defining it as a clear violation of international law. They also expressed concern about the use of assurances [See A/HRC/6/17/Add.3, para. 36; A/HRC/4/40, paras. 43 and 50; E/CN.4/2004/3, para. 69; A/HRC/4/41, para. 458 and A/60/316, para. 45; CAT/C/USA/CO/2, paras. 20-21; and A/60/316, E/CN.4/2006/6 and A/HRC/4/40, paras. 52-56].

143. Given the prevailing secrecy regarding the CIA rendition programme, exact figures regarding the numbers of prisoners transferred to the custody of other Governments by the CIA without spending any time in CIA facilities are difficult to ascertain. Equally, little is known about the number of detainees who have been held at the request of other States, such as the United Kingdom and Canada. While several of these allegations cannot be backed up by other sources, the experts wish to underscore that the consistency of many of the detailed allegations provided separately by detainees adds weight to the inclusion of Jordan, Egypt, Morocco, the Syrian Arab Republic, Pakistan, Ethiopia and Djibouti as proxy detention facilities where detainees have been held on behalf of the CIA. Serious concerns also exist about the role of Uzbekistan as a proxy detention site.

1.  Jordan

144. At least 15 prisoners, mostly seized in Karachi, Pakistan, or in the Pankisi Gorge in Georgia, claim to have been rendered by the CIA to the main headquarters of the General Intelligence Department of Jordan in Amman, between September 2001 and 2004. They include three men and one juvenile subsequently transferred to Guantanamo via Afghanistan:

• Jamal Mar’i, a Yemeni, and the first known victim of rendition in the wake of the attacks of 11 September 2001. Seized from his house in Karachi, on 23 September 2001, he was held for four months in Jordan before being flown to Guantanamo, where he remains [PDF, pp. 130-44] [Postscript: he was freed in December 2009].

• Mohamedou Ould Slahi, a Mauritanian, was rendered to Jordan after handing himself to Mauritanian authorities on 28 November 2001. Mr. Slahi was held in Jordan for eight months, and described what happened to him as “beyond description”. He was then transferred to Afghanistan, where he spent two weeks, and arrived in Guantanamo, where he remains, on 4 August 2002 [PDF, pp. 28-38; PDF, pp. 184-218][Postscript: he won his habeas petition in March 2010].

• Ali al-Hajj al-Sharqawi, a Yemeni, was rendered to Jordan after his capture in Karachi on 7 February 2002. Flown to Afghanistan on 8 January 2004, he was held there for eight months, then flown to Guantanamo on 20 September 2004. Still held at Guantanamo, he has stated that he was continuously tortured throughout his 23 months in Jordan. [Postscript: his torture was referred to by a US judge in this habeas petition].

• Hassan bin Attash, a Saudi-born Yemeni, was 17 years old when he was seized in Karachi on 11 September 2002 with Ramzi bin al-Shibh. He was held in Jordan until  8 January 2004, when he was flown to Afghanistan with Ali al-Hajj al-Sharqawi. He was then delivered to Guantanamo with al-Sharqawi on 20 September 2004. Still held at Guantanamo, he has stated that he was tortured throughout his time in Jordan.

145. Also held were Abu Hamza al-Tabuki, a Saudi seized by United States agents in Afghanistan in December 2001 and released in Saudi Arabia in late 2002 or early 2003, and Samer Helmi al-Barq, seized in Pakistan on 15 July 2003, who was kept for three months in a secret prison outside Pakistan, before being transferred to Jordan on 26 October 2003. He was released on bail in January 2008 [Others reportedly held in Jordan are Jamil Qasim Saeed Mohammed, a Yemeni student rendered from Karachi on 23 October 2001, who has not been heard of since; Ibrahim al- Jeddawi, a Saudi seized in Yemen (or Kuwait) in the first half of 2002, who was reportedly transferred to Saudi custody; at least five other men (three Algerians, a Syrian and a Chechen), seized in Georgia in 2002; an Iraqi Kurd, possibly seized in Yemen; and a Tunisian, seized in Iraq. The current whereabouts of all these men is unknown. According to former prisoners interviewed by Human Rights Watch, Ramzi bin al-Shibh, seized with Hassan bin Attash and one of 14 “high-value detainees” transferred to Guantanamo in September 2006, was also held in Jordan for an unspecified amount of time, as was Ibn al-Sheikh al-Libi, seized in Afghanistan in late 2001, who was subjected to multiple renditions. See also para. 146. For Samer Helmi al-Barq, see Amnesty International, submission to the United Nations Universal Periodic Review, February 2009 (PDF)].

2.  Egypt

146. At least seven men were rendered to Egypt by the CIA between September 2001 and February 2003, and another was rendered to Egypt from the Syrian Arab Republic, where he had been seized at the request of the Canadian authorities:

• Abdel Hakim Khafargy, an Egyptian-born, Munich-based publisher, was allegedly seized in Bosnia and Herzegovina on 24 September 2001, and rendered to Egypt a few weeks later, after being held by United States forces at its base in Tuzla. He was returned to Germany two months later [PDF].

• Mamdouh Habib, an Australian seized in Pakistan in November 2001, was rendered to Egypt three weeks later and held for six months. Transferred to Guantanamo in June 2002, he was released in January 2005. He claims to have been tortured throughout his time in Egypt [For recent developments, see this article].

• Muhammad Saad Iqbal Madni, a Pakistani-Egyptian national, was seized by the Indonesian authorities in Jakarta on 9 January 2002, flown first to Egypt and then to Bagram, where he was held for 11 months. He arrived in Guantanamo on 23 March 2003 and was released in August 2008. Mr. Madni indicated that, during his detention in Cairo, he was subjected to ill-treatment, including electroshocks applied to his head and knees and, on several occasions, he was hung from metal hooks and beaten. Furthermore, he reported that was denied medical treatment for the blood in his urine [Interview with Muhammad Saad Iqbal Madni (annex II, case 15)].

• As confirmed by the Government of Sweden in its response to a letter sent by the experts, following a decision made by the Government to refuse asylum in Sweden to the Egyptian citizens Mohammed Alzery and Ahmed Agiza and to expel them, they were deported to Egypt by the Swedish Security Police with the assistance of the United States authorities (CIA). Both have said that they were tortured in Egyptian custody [Agiza v Sweden, communication 233/2003 (CAT/C/34/D/233/2003); and Alzery v Sweden, communication 1416/2006 (CCPR/C/88/D/1416/2005)]. Alzery was released on 12 October 2003 without charge or trial, but was placed under police surveillance. Ahmed Agiza had already been tried and sentenced in absentia by an Egyptian military court at the time of the decision by the Government of Sweden to deport him. In April 2004, the court’s decision was confirmed and Agiza was convicted on terrorism charges following a trial monitored by Human Rights Watch, which described it as “flagrantly unfair”.

• Ibn al-Sheikh al-Libi, a Libyan, an emir of the Khaldan training camp in Afghanistan, was seized by Pakistani officials in late 2001 while fleeing Afghanistan and was rendered to Egypt where, under torture, he claimed that there were links between Al-Qaida and Saddam Hussein, which were used by the United States administration to justify the invasion of Iraq. Also held in secret CIA detention sites in Afghanistan, and possibly in other countries, he was returned to the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya in 2006, where he reportedly died by committing suicide in May 2009.

• Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr (also known as Abu Omar), an Egyptian, was kidnapped in Milan on 17 February 2003, and rendered to Egypt, where he was held for four years (including 14 months in secret detention) before being released [For more details on this case, in particular with regard to the abduction of Abu Omar in Milan and the ensuing judicial proceedings in Italy, see the section on Italian complicity in the renditions programme below]. Allegations of ill-treatment in Egyptian detention include being hung upside down and having had electric shocks applied to his testicles [PDF, p, 4].

The eighth man, Ahmad Abou El-Maati, a Canadian-Egyptian national, was seized at Damascus airport on his arrival from Toronto on 11 November 2001. He was held in the Far Falestin prison in the Syrian Arab Republic until 25 January 2002, when he was transferred to Egyptian custody, where he remained in various detention sites (including in secret detention until August 2002) until his release on 7 March 2004. During the initial period of his detention in Egypt, he was subjected to heavy beatings and threats of rape against his sister. At a later stage during the secret detention phase, he was handcuffed with his hands behind his back practically continuously for 45 days in a solitary confinement cell, which he described as being very painful and which made it hard to use the toilet and wash. He was also subjected to sleep deprivation [Internal inquiry into the actions of Canadian officials in relation to Abdullah Almalki, Ahmad Abou-Elmaati and Muayyed Nureddin, pursuant to an Order in Council dated 11 December 2006.  See also Commission of inquiry into the actions of Canadian officials in relation to Maher Arar, report of the fact finder of 14 October 2005].

3.  Syrian Arab Republic

147. At least nine detainees were rendered by the CIA to the Syrian Arab Republic between December 2001 and October 2002, and held in Far Falestin, run by Syrian Military Intelligence. All those able to speak about their experiences explained that they were tortured. As in the case of Egypt (see para. 146 above), other men were seized at the request of the Canadian authorities:

• Muhammad Haydar Zammar, a German national, was seized in Morocco on 8 December 2001, and rendered by the CIA to Far Falestin on 22 December 2001. In October 2004, he was moved to an “unknown location”; in February 2007, he received a 12-year sentence from the Higher State Security Court. He was convicted of being a member of the banned Muslim Brotherhood, a crime punishable by death in the Syrian Arab Republic [See A/HRC/7/4/Add.1., this Amnesty International appeal, and CAT/C/49/Add.4]. In its reply for the present study, the Government of Morocco indicated that the police had arrested Mr. Zammar following information that he had been implicated in the events of 11 September 2001. The Government also stated that Mr. Zammar had not been subjected to secret or arbitrary detention in Morocco, and that he had been transferred to the Syrian Arab Republic on 30 December 2001, in the presence of the Syrian Ambassador accredited to Morocco.

• Three detainees were rendered to the Syrian Arab Republic on 14 May 2002: Abdul Halim Dahak, a student seized in Pakistan in November 2001, Omar Ghramesh and an unnamed teenager, the latter being seized with Abu Zubaydah in Faisalabad, Pakistan, on 28 March 2002 [Stephen Grey, Ghost Plane: The Inside Story of the CIA’s Rendition Programme, Hurst & Co., 2006), pp. 4, 54 and 284]. All had been tortured. Their current whereabouts are unknown.

• Noor al-Deen, a Syrian teenager, was captured with Abu Zubaydah and rendered to Morocco, then to the Syrian Arab Republic. His current whereabouts are unknown.

• According to Abdullah Almalki (see para. 148 below), two other prisoners, Barah Abdul Latif and Bahaa Mustafa Jaghel, were also transferred from Pakistan to the Syrian Arab Republic, the first in February/March 2002, the second in May 2002. Both had been tortured. Their current whereabouts are unknown.

• Yasser Tinawi, a Syrian national seized in Somalia on 17 July 2002, was flown to Ethiopia by United States agents, who interrogated him for three months. On 26 October, he was flown to Egypt; on 29 October 2002, he arrived in the Syrian Arab Republic. In March 2003, he received a two-year sentence from a military court.

• Maher Arar, a Canadian-Syrian national, was seized at John F. Kennedy airport in New York on 26 September 2002, held for 11 days in the Metropolitan Detention Centre in Manhattan, then rendered to the Syrian Arab Republic on 8 October, via Jordan [A/HRC/4/33/Add.3, paras. 33, 43-45, footnote 11], where he was held in secret detention at Far Falestin until later that month. Jordan alleged that Mr. Arar had arrived in Amman as an ordinary passenger, but was asked to leave the country because his name was on a list of wanted terrorists, and given a choice of destination. It also alleged that he had asked to be voluntarily taken by car to the Syrian Arab Republic. During his period at Far Falestin, he was severely beaten with a black cable and threatened with electric shocks: “The pattern was for Mr. Arar to receive three or four lashes with the cable then to be questioned, and then for the beating to begin again.” The torture allegations were found to be completely consistent with the results of the forensic examinations conducted in Canada. On 14 August 2003, Mr. Arar was moved to Sednaya prison and released on 29 September. The official inquiry in the Arar case also stressed the catastrophic impact of the described events in terms of his and his family’s economic situation and his family life in general.

148. When Ahmad Abou El-Maati (see para. 146) was held in Far Falestin in the Syrian Arab Republic, he was held in solitary confinement in poor conditions and subjected to ill-treatment, including blindfolding, forced to remove almost all his clothes, beaten with cables, forcible shaving and had ice-cold water poured on him. Abdullah Almalki, a Canadian-Syrian national, also spent time in secret detention in the Syrian Arab Jamahiriya, in Far Falestin, from 3 May to 7 July 2002, when he received a family visit. On 25 August 2003, he was sent to Sednaya prison. He was released on 10 March 2004. He returned to Canada on 25 July 2004 after being acquitted of all charges by the Syrian State Supreme Security court [Internal inquiry, paras. 10-38] .

149. Another Canadian, Muayyed Nureddin, an Iraqi-born geologist, was detained on the border of the Syrian Arab Republic and Iraq on 11 December 2002, when he returned from a family visit in northern Iraq. He was secretly detained for a month in Far Falestin, then released on 13 January 2003 [Internal inquiry, paras. 10-38].

150. In its response to the questionnaire sent by the experts, the Government of the Syrian Arab Republic stated that the country had no secret prisons or detention centres. There were no cases of secret detention, and no individuals had been arrested without the knowledge of the competent authorities. No authorization had been granted to the security service of any foreign State to establish secret detention facilities in the Syrian Arab Republic. A number of foreign individuals had been arrested in the country at the request of other States, and had been informed of the legal basis for the arrests and their places of detention. The above-mentioned States were also informed of whether the individuals concerned had been brought before the Courts or transferred outside of the country. Individuals belonging to different terrorist groups had been prosecuted and detained in public prisons, in compliance with relevant international standards. They would be judged by the competent judicial authorities. Court proceedings would be public and be held in the presence of defence lawyers, families, human rights activists and foreign diplomats. Some would be publicized through the media. The Interpol branch within the Security Service of the Ministry of the Interior was cooperating with international Interpol branches with regard to suspected terrorist and other criminal activities.

4.  Morocco

151. At least three detainees were rendered to Morocco by the CIA between May and July 2002, and held in Temara prison, including the following:

• Abou Elkassim Britel, of Moroccan origin and an Italian citizen through marriage and naturalization, was seized in Lahore, Pakistan, on 10 March 2002. He stated that he was tortured in Pakistani custody. On 23 May 2002, he was rendered by the CIA to Morocco, where he was held in secret detention until February 2003, and where he alleged he was also tortured. He was released in February 2003, but in May 2003 was seized again, held for another four months in Temara, then sentenced to 15 years in prison, which was reduced to nine years on appeal [Interview with Khadija Anna L. Pighizzini, wife of Abou Elkassim Britel (annex II, case 7)]. In its submission for the present study, the Government of Morocco stated that Mr. Britel had not been subjected to “arbitrary detention or torture” between May 2002 and February 2003, or between May and September 2003.

• Binyam Mohamed, an Ethiopian national and British resident, was seized in Karachi, Pakistan, on 10 April 2002. He was held for approximately three months, during which time he was subjected to torture. On 21 July 2002, he was rendered by the CIA to Morocco, where he was held for 18 months in three different unknown facilities. During that period, he was allegedly threatened, subjected to particularly severe torture and other forms of ill-treatment; deprived from sleep for up to 48 hours at a time; and his prayers were interrupted by turning up the volume of pornographic movies. In January 2004, he was flown to the CIA “dark prison” in Kabul, and in May he was moved to Bagram. He was flown to Guantanamo on 20 September 2004, and was released in February 2009 [Interview with Binyam Mohamed (annex II, case 18); see also the finding of two British High Court judges that the treatment to which he had been subjected presented an “arguable case of torture, or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment” (PDF)] [The third prisoner is Noor al-Deen (see para. 147), who was moved to the Syrian Arab Republic in 2003].

5.  Pakistan

152. From December 2001 until the summer of 2002, when the majority of the detainees who ended up in Guantanamo were seized, detention facilities in Pakistan, where several hundred detainees were held before being transferred to Kandahar or Bagram, were a crucial component of what was then, exclusively, a secret detention programme. Many of these men, seized near the Pakistani border, or while crossing from Afghanistan to Pakistan, were held in prisons in Kohat and Peshawar, but others were held in what appear to be impromptu facilities, which were established across the country in numerous locations. The then President of Pakistan, Pervez Musharraf, stated that:

Since shortly after 9/11, when many Al-Qaida members fled Afghanistan and crossed the border into Pakistan, we have played multiple games of cat and mouse with them. The biggest of them all, Osama bin Laden, is still at large at the time of this writing, but we have caught many, many others. Some are known to the world, some are not. We have captured 672 and handed over 369 to the United States. We have earned bounties totalling millions of dollars [Pervez Musharraf, In The Line Of Fire: A Memoir, Free Press, 2006].

153. Two former prisoners, Moazzam Begg and Omar Deghayes, described their experiences of secret detention in Pakistan to the experts:

Omar Deghayes, a Libyan national and British resident, was arrested in April 2002 at his home in Lahore after a hundred people in black tracksuits surrounded the house. In the presence of an American officer, he was then taken, handcuffed and hooded, to a police station and, shortly afterwards, to an old fortress outside Lahore, where he was held with other men from Palestine, Tunisia, the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya and Egypt, and beaten and kicked, and heard electroshocks and people screaming. According to his account, “the place was run by Pakistanis and appeared to be a maximum security prison for extremist opponents that were traded with different States such as Libya and the United States.” He also stated that he was tortured for a month without any contact with the external world, and that the ill-treatment included punching, beating, kicking, stripping, being hit in the back with wooden sticks, and stress positions for up to three days and three nights. In mid-May, two Americans in plain clothes visited, took photographs and asked questions. He was then moved to a place in Islamabad, which looked like a barracks, where he was held incommunicado for one month without access to a lawyer or ICRC, and was interrogated in a nearby house by American officers, who identified themselves as CIA, and, on one occasion, by a British agent from MI6. He said that torture took place in the barracks but not during the interrogations, and that he was subjected to drowning and stress positions, and recalled a room full of caged snakes that guards threatened to open if he did not speak about what he had done in Afghanistan. He then met with British and American officers, who finally “acquired” him with other detainees, and took him to Bagram, where he was heavily tortured and sexually abused by American soldiers. He was flown to Guantanamo in August 2002, and released in December 2007 [Interview with Omar Deghayes (annex II, case 8)].

Moazzam Begg, a British citizen, moved to Kabul, with his wife and three children, to become a teacher and a charity worker in 2001. After leaving Afghanistan in the wake of the United States-led invasion, on 31 January 2002, he was abducted from a house in Islamabad, where he was living with his family, and taken to a place in Islamabad (not an official detention facility), where those who held him were not uniformed officers and there were people held in isolation. Held for three weeks, he was moved to a different venue for interviews with American and British intelligence officers, but his wife did not know where he had been taken, and he was denied access to a lawyer or consular services. He was then taken to a military airport near Islamabad and handed over to American officers. He was held in Afghanistan and Guantanamo for three years, and was released in January 2005 [Interview with Moazzam Begg (annex II, case 6)].

6.  Ethiopia

154. The Government of Ethiopia served as the detaining authority for foreign nationals of interest to United States and possibly other foreign intelligence officers between 30 December 2006 and February 2007 [For allegations in interviews conducted by Federal Bureau of Investigation officers, see for example the case of Meshal vs Higgenbotham. See also Human Rights Watch, “Why am I still here?: the 2007 Horn of Africa renditions and the fate of those still missing” (PDF)]. On 2 May 2007, a number of special procedures addressed the Government of Ethiopia, adding the following details:

In December 2006, the conflict between the militias of the Council of Somali Islamic Courts and the Transitional Federal Government of Somalia, supported by armed forces of Ethiopia, caused a large flow of refugees seeking to cross the border from Somalia into Kenya. On 2 January 2007, Kenyan authorities announced the closure of the border for security reasons. Since then, it is reported that the Kenyan security forces have been patrolling the border and have arrested a number of those seeking to cross it. Kenya has deported at least 84 of those arrested back to Somalia, from where they were taken to Ethiopia [A/HRC/7/3/Add.1, para. 71].

155. The experts interviewed two of those captured between December 2006 and February 2007: Bashir Ahmed Makhtal (mentioned in the Special Rapporteur’s communication) and Mohamed Ezzoueck. The latter, a British national, was detained on 20 January 2007 in Kiunga village, Kenya, after crossing the Somali-Kenyan border and then transferred to Nairobi, where he was held in three different locations. Mr. Ezzoueck reported having been detained in Kenya for about three weeks and then transferred to Somalia, where he was held for a few days before being transferred, via Nairobi, back to London. According to his testimony, he was interrogated by a Kenyan army major and Kenyan intelligence service officers, FBI officers and British security services officers, and repeatedly asked about his involvement with terrorist groups, including Al Qaida [Interview with Mohamed Ezzouek (annex II, case 10)]. Mr. Makhtal, an Ethiopian-born Canadian, was arrested on the border between Kenya and Somalia on 30 December 2006 by intelligence agents and held at a police detention centre. He was subsequently transferred by car to a prison cell in Gigiri police station in Nairobi. On 21 January 2007, the Kenyan authorities sent him to Mogadishu. On the following day, he was taken to Addis Ababa by an Ethiopian military plane. He was then held for approximately 18 months incommunicado in Mekalawi federal prison, often in solitary confinement and in poor conditions, then ultimately sentenced to life imprisonment by the High Court of Ethiopia [Interview with Bashir Makhtal (annex II, case 16)].

156. In a letter dated 23 May 2007, the Government of Ethiopia informed the relevant special procedures mandate holders that the Transitional Federal Government of Somalia had handed over to Ethiopia 41 individuals captured in the course of the conflict in Somalia; most of these detainees had been released. Only eight of the detainees remained in custody by order of the court. The Government also noted that “the allegation that there are more than seventy others in addition to those named in the communication is false, as are the allegations that the detainees are held incommunicado, and that they might be at risk of torture” [A/HRC/7/3/Add.1, para. 71]. However, in September 2008, Human Rights Watch published a report stating that at least 10 detainees were still in Ethiopian custody, and the whereabouts of others were unknown [PDF].

7.  Djibouti

157. The experts received information proving that a detainee in the CIA secret detention programme, Mohammed al-Asad, had been transferred by Tanzanian officials by plane to Djibouti on 27 December 2003 [High Court of Tanzania at Dar es Salaam, criminal application No. 23 of 2004, Abdullah Salehe Mohsen al-Asad vs. Director of Immigration Services ex parte Mohamed Abdullah Salehe Mohsen Al-Asaad counter affidavit, 30 June 2004]. In Djibouti, Mr. al-Asad was detained for two weeks in secret detention, where he was interrogated by a white English-speaking woman and a male interpreter, mostly on his connections to the al-Haramain foundation. The woman identified herself as American. Mr. al-Asad’s own recollection is consistent with his having been held in Djibouti. One of his guards told him that he was in Djibouti and there was a photograph of President Guelleh on the wall of the detention facility. After approximately two weeks, Mr. al-Asad was taken to an airport in Djibouti, where a team of individuals dressed entirely in black stripped him, inserted an object in his rectum, diapered and photographed him, and strapped him down in a plane. The detention site may have been in Camp Lemonier, which allegedly has been used on a short-term or transitory basis for several detainees being transferred to secret detention elsewhere.

8.  Uzbekistan

158. No confirmation has ever been provided by either the Government of the United States or that of Uzbekistan that detainees were rendered to proxy prisons in Uzbekistan. In May 2005, however, the New York Times spoke to “a half-dozen current and former intelligence officials working in Europe, the Middle East and the United States” who stated that the United States had sent terror suspects to Uzbekistan for detention and interrogation. A United States intelligence official estimated that the number of terrorism suspects sent by the United States to Tashkent was in the dozens. The New York Times also obtained flight logs, showing that at least seven flights were made to Uzbekistan from early 2002 to late 2003” by two planes associated with the CIA rendition programme (a Gulfstream jet and a Boeing 737), and noted that, on 21 September 2003, both planes had arrived at Tashkent. According to the newspaper, the flight logs showed that “the Gulfstream had taken off from Baghdad, while the 737 had departed from the Czech Republic”. On 14 August 2009, the BBC interviewed Ikrom Yakubov, an Uzbek intelligence officer who has been granted political asylum in the United Kingdom, who stated that the United States had rendered terrorist suspects for questioning to Uzbekistan, but added, “I don’t want to talk about it as there might be serious concerns for my life in the future to discuss renditions.” On 22 August 2009, the story resurfaced once more, when Der Spiegel reported that, in an arrangement between the private security firm Blackwater and the CIA, Blackwater and its subsidiaries had been commissioned “to transport terror suspects from Guantanamo to interrogations at secret prison camps in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Uzbekistan”.

D.  Complicity in the practice of secret detention

159. After September 2006, the direct role of the CIA in secret detentions seemed to have shrunk significantly, with “current and former American Government officials” explaining in May 2009 to the New York Times that, in the last two years of the Bush administration, the Government of the United States had started to rely heavily on the foreign intelligence services to capture, interrogate and detain all but the highest level terrorist suspects seized outside the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan. According to the newspaper, “in the past 10 months, … about a half-dozen mid-level financiers and logistics experts working with Al-Qaida have been captured and are being held by intelligence services in four Middle Eastern countries after the United States provided information that led to their arrests by local security services”. Instead of actively detaining persons in secret, the United States — and many other countries — became complicit in the practice of secret detention. For the purposes of the present study, the experts state that a country is complicit in the secret detention of a person in the following cases:

(a) When a State has asked another State to secretly detain a person (covering all cases mentioned in paras. 141-158 above);

(b) When a State knowingly takes advantage of the situation of secret detention by sending questions to the State detaining the person or by soliciting or receiving information from persons who are being kept in secret detention. This includes at least the following States:

• The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, in the cases of several individuals, including Binyam Mohamed [Interview with Binyam Mohamed (annex II, case 18)], Salahuddin Amin, Zeeshan Siddiqui, Rangzieb Ahmed and Rashid Rauf [PDF]. In its submission for the present study, the British Government referred to ongoing and concluded judicial assessment of the cases and stressed the work of the parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee, as well as its policy of clear opposition to secret detention [According to the Government of the United Kingdom, the judge in Mr Ahmed’s case stated, “I specifically reject the allegations that the British authorities were outsourcing torture”. The judge examined Mr. Amin’s allegations and found that there was no evidence to suggest that the British authorities had been complicit in his unlawful detention or ill-treatment in Pakistan];

• Germany, in the case of Muhammad Haydar Zammar, who was reportedly interrogated on at least one occasion, on 20 November 2002, by agents of German security agencies while he was secretly held in the Syrian Arab Republic [See “Kanzleramt dealte mit Syriens Geheimdienst”, Der Spiegel, 19 November 2005]. The Government reported having been  informed about four cases of renditions or enforced disappearances concerning the Federal Republic of Germany: the cases of Khaled El-Masri, Murat Kurnaz, Muhammad Haydar Zammar and Abdel Halim Khafagy, which occurred between September 2001 and the end of 2005. However, the German authorities did not directly or indirectly participate in arresting these persons or in rendering them for imprisonment. In the cases of El-Masri and Khafagy, the German missions responsible for consular assistance had no knowledge of their imprisonment and were therefore unable to ensure that their rights were observed or guarantee consular protection; in the cases of Zammar and Kurnaz, the German authorities worked intensively to guarantee consular protection. However, they were denied access to the detainees and were thereby prevented from effectively exercising consular protection [Response to a questionnaire on allegations of rendition and detention sent by the Working Group on Enforced and Involuntary Disappearances, 30 September 2009]. In a letter dated 9 December 2009, the German Federal Ministry of Justice further reported that it had become aware of the case of Mr. Kurnaz on 26 February 2002, when the Chief Federal Prosecutor informed the Ministry that it would not take over a preliminary investigation pending before the Prosecution of the Land of Bremen. The Office of the Chief Federal Prosecutor had received a report from the Federal Criminal Police Office on 31 January 2002 that, according to information by the Federal Intelligence Service, Mr. Kurnaz had been arrested by United States officials in Afghanistan or Pakistan. In the case of Mr. El-Masri, on 8 June 2004, the Federal Chancellery and the Federal Foreign Office received a letter from his lawyer that Mr. El-Masri had been abducted in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia on 31 December 2003, presumably transferred to Afghanistan and kept there against his will until his return to Germany on 29 May 2004. The Federal Ministry of Justice was informed about these facts on 18 June 2004. The experts note, however, that according to the final report of a Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry, the Government became aware of the case of Mr. El-Masri on 31 May 2004, when the Ambassador of the United States informed the Federal Minister for the Interior of Germany [PDF];

• Canada, for providing intelligence to the Syrian Arab Republic in the cases of Maher Arar, Ahmad el-Maati, Abdullah Almaki and Muayyed Nureddin. In its submission for the present study, the Government denied that any of the named individuals was detained or seized by a State at the request of Canada. The experts welcome the fact that all the above-mentioned cases have been the subject of extensive independent inquiry processes within Canada and that, in the case of Mr. Arar, substantive reparations has been provided to the victims;

• Australia, for providing intelligence to interrogators in the case of the secret detention of Mamdouh Habib. Mr Habib also alleges that an Australian official was present during at least one of his interrogation sessions in Egypt. The experts understand that Mr. Habib is currently suing the Government of Australia, arguing that it was complicit in his kidnapping and subsequent transfer to Egypt. In its submission for the present study, the Government denies that any Australian officer, servant and/or agent was involved in any dealings with or mistreatment of Mr. Habib, and refers to ongoing litigation;

(c) When a State has actively participated in the arrest and/or transfer of a person when it knew, or ought to have known, that the person would disappear in a secret detention facility or otherwise be detained outside the legally regulated detention system. This includes at least the following States:

• Italy, for its role in the abduction and rendition of Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr (also known as Abu Omar), an Egyptian kidnapped by CIA agents on a street in Milan in broad daylight on 17 February 2003. He was transferred from Milan to the NATO military base at Aviano by car, and then flown, via the NATO military base of Ramstein in Germany, to Egypt, where he was held for four years (including 14 months in secret detention) before being released. The European Parliament considered it “very likely, in view of the involvement of its secret services, that the Italian Government of the day was aware of the extraordinary rendition of Abu Omar from within its territory” [European Parliament Committee report, paras. 50 and 54]. Prosecutors opened an investigation and charged 26 United States citizens (mostly CIA agents) with abduction, as well as members of the Italian military secret services (SISMI) with complicity in the abduction, among them the head of SISMI [Reply of the Government of Italy to the joint request for relevant information by the four experts (see annex I)]. The Italian Ministry of Justice, however, refused to forward the judiciary’s requests for extradition of the CIA agents to the Government of the United States; as a result, the United States citizens were tried in absentia. On 4 November 2009, the court found 23 of them guilty. The court also convicted two SISMI agents and sentenced them to three years imprisonment for their involvement in the abduction. The then commander of SISMI and his deputy, however, were not convicted, the court having dismissed the cases against them on the grounds that the relevant evidence was covered by State secret [The executive branch of the Government of Italy successfully raised the issue of State secret before the Constitutional Court; see the reply of the Government of Italy to the joint request for relevant information by the four experts (annex I)]. In its submission for the present study, the Government of Italy notes that the case is continuing at the appeal level, which prevents it from drawing any conclusions prior to a definitive verdict;

• Kenya, for detaining 84 persons in various secret locations in Nairobi before transferring them on three charter flights between 20 January and 10 February 2007 to Somalia. They were subsequently transferred to Ethiopia, where they were kept in secret detention. They were not provided with an opportunity to challenge their forcible physical removal at any stage (see also paras. 154-156 above) [See also Meshal vs Higgenbotham; Redress and Reprieve report, “Kenya and counter terrorism: a time for change”, February 2009 (PDF), and Human Rights Watch, “Why am I still here?” (PDF). The experts have received allegations of cooperation with United States intelligence that dates back to 2003; see interview with Suleiman Abdallah (annex II, case 2)].

(d) A specific form of complicity in this context are these cases where a State holds a person shortly in secret detention before handing them over to another State where that person will be put in secret detention for a longer period. This includes at least the following countries:

• The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, for its role in the case of Khaled El-Masri [Interview with Khaled el-Masri (annex II, case 9)];

• Malawi, for allegedly holding Laid Saidi in secret detention for a week;

• The Gambia: during an interview with the experts, Bisher al-Rawi reported that, on 8 November 2002, he was arrested upon arrival at Banjul airport by the Gambian Intelligence Agency, then taken to an office and later to a house located in a Banjul residential place before he was handed over to the CIA and rendered to Afghanistan.

(e) When a State has failed to take measures to identify persons or airplanes passing through its airports or airspace after information of the CIA programme involving secret detention had already been revealed. The issue of rendition flights was, and still is, the subject of many separate investigations at the national or regional level. Therefore, the experts decided to refrain from going into the details of this issue [See, inter alia, the European Parliament Committee report, 18 June 2009 (PDF); the statement of the Foreign Secretary to the House of Commons on United States rendition flights, 21 February 2008, and Dick Marty,”Secret detentions and illegal transfers of detainees involving Council of Europe member states: second report” (PDF)].

E.  Secret detention and the Obama administration

160. In its response to the questionnaire sent by the experts, the United States stated that:

The Obama Administration has adopted the following specific measures:

• Instructed the CIA to close as expeditiously as possible any detention facilities that it currently operated as of January 22, 2009 and ordered that the CIA shall not operate any such detention facility in the future.

• Ordered that the Guantanamo Bay detention facility be closed as soon as practicable.

• Required the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to be given notice and timely access to any individual detained in any armed conflict in the custody or under the effective control of the United States Government, consistent with Department of Defense regulations and policies.

• Ordered a comprehensive review of the lawful options available to the Federal Government with respect to detention of individuals captured or apprehended in connection with armed conflicts and counterterrorism operations.

• Reaffirmed that all persons in U.S. custody must be treated humanely as a matter of law.

• Mandated that detention at Guantanamo conform to all applicable laws governing conditions of confinement, including Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions, and directed a review of detention conditions at Guantanamo to ensure such compliance.

• Ordered a review of U.S. transfer policies to ensure that they do not result in the transfer of individuals to other nations to face torture or otherwise for the purpose, or with the effect, of undermining or circumventing the commitments or obligations of the United States to ensure the humane treatment of individuals in its custody or control. The resulting Task Force on transfer practices recommended to the President in August that (1) the State Department be involved in evaluating all diplomatic assurances; (2) the Inspectors General of the Departments of State, Defense, and Homeland Security prepare an annual report on all transfers relying on assurances; and (3) mechanisms for monitoring treatment in the receiving country be incorporated into assurances.

• Announced the transfer of at least 7 detainees from military custody to U.S. criminal law enforcement proceedings, and transferred 25 detainees to date to third-countries for repatriation or resettlement.

• Worked with Congress to revise U.S. laws governing military commissions to enhance their procedural protections, including prohibiting introduction of evidence obtained as a result of cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment.

• Expanded the review procedures for detainees held by the Department of Defense in Afghanistan in order to enhance the transparency and fairness of U.S. detention practices. Detainees are permitted an opportunity to challenge the evidence that is the basis for their detention, to call reasonably available witnesses, and to have the assistance of personal representatives who have access to all reasonably available relevant information (including classified information). Proceedings generally shall be open, including to representatives of the ICRC, and possibly to non-governmental organizations.

• Established more tailored standards and rigorous procedures for evaluating assertions of the State secrets privilege, including establishing an internal accountability mechanism, ensuring that the privilege is never asserted to avoid embarrassment or conceal violations of law, and creating a referral mechanism to the Office of Inspector General where the privilege is asserted but there is credible evidence of a violation of law. These standards and procedures were established in order to strike a better balance between open government and the need to protect vital national security information.

• The Department of Justice initiated a preliminary criminal investigation into the interrogation of certain detainees.

These measures cumulatively seek to reaffirm the importance of compliance with the rule of law in U.S. detention practices, to ensure U.S. adherence to its international legal obligations, and to promote accountability and transparency in this important area of national security policy.

161. The experts welcome the above commitments. They believe, however, that clarification is required as to whether detainees were held in CIA “black sites” in Iraq and Afghanistan or elsewhere when President Obama took office, and, if so, what happened to the detainees who were held at that time. Also, the experts are concerned that the executive order instructing the CIA “to close any detention facilities that it currently operates” does not extend to the facilities where the CIA detains individuals on “a short-term transitory basis”. The order also does not seem to extend to detention facilities operated by the Joint Special Operation Command.

162. The experts also welcome in particular the new policy implemented in August 2009, under which the military must notify ICRC of detainees’ names and identification number within two weeks of capture. Nevertheless, there is no legal justification for this two-week period of secret detention. According to article 70 of the Third Geneva Convention, prisoners of war are to be documented, and their whereabouts and health conditions made available to family members and to the country of origin of the prisoner within one week. Article 106 of the Fourth Geneva Convention (governing the treatment of civilians) establishes virtually identical procedures for the documentation and disclosure of information concerning civilian detainees. Furthermore, it is obvious that this unacknowledged detention for one week can only be applied to persons who have been captured on the battlefield in a situation of armed conflict. This is an important observation, as the experts noted with concern news reports quoting current Government officials saying that “the importance of Bagram as a holding site for terrorism suspects captured outside Afghanistan and Iraq has risen under the Obama administration, which barred the Central Intelligence Agency from using its secret prisons for long-term detention”.

163. The situation at the Bagram Theater Internment Facility remains of great concern. In March 2009, United States district Court Judge John D. Bates ruled that the habeas corpus rights granted to the Guantanamo detainees by the Supreme Court in June 2008 extended to non-Afghan detainees who had been seized in other countries and rendered to Bagram because “the detainees themselves as well as the rationale for detention are essentially the same”, and because the review process established at the prison “falls well short of what the Supreme Court found inadequate at Guantánamo”. The four petitioners were among the 94 prisoners that Assistant Attorney General Stephen G. Bradbury admitted were held in CIA custody between 2001 and 2005. Judge Bates found that, in holding detainees at Bagram not as prisoners of war but as “unlawful enemy combatants”, the Bush administration had put in place a review process, the Unlawful Enemy Combatant Review Board, in which “detainees cannot even speak for themselves; they are only permitted to submit a written statement. But in submitting that statement, detainees do not know what evidence the United States relies upon to justify an ‘enemy combatant’ designation — so they lack a meaningful opportunity to rebut that evidence”.

164. The above-mentioned ruling has been appealed by the current United States administration, even though Judge Bates noted that habeas rights extend neither to Afghan detainees held at Bagram, nor to Afghans seized in other countries and rendered to Bagram. In its appeal against Judge Bates’ ruling, the United States administration notified the court that it was introducing a new review process at Bagram, “modifying the procedures for reviewing the status of aliens held by the Department of Defense at the Bagram Theater Internment Facility” [PDF]. However, the experts are concerned that the new review system fails to address the fact that detainees in an active war zone should be held according to the Geneva Conventions, screened close to the time and place of capture if there is any doubt about their status, and not be subjected to reviews at some point after their capture to determine whether they should continue to be held. The experts are also concerned that the system appears to aim specifically to prevent United States courts from having access to foreign detainees captured in other countries and rendered to Bagram. While the experts welcome the fact that the names of 645 detainees at Bagram are now known, they urge the Government of the United States to provide information on the citizenship, length of detention and place of capture of all detainees currently held at Bagram Air Base.

Andy Worthington is the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by Macmillan in the US, and available from Amazon — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to my RSS feed (and I can also be found on Facebook and Twitter). Also see my definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, updated in January 2010, details about the new documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (co-directed by Polly Nash and Andy Worthington, currently on tour in the UK, and available on DVD here), and my definitive Guantánamo habeas list, and, if you appreciate my work, feel free to make a donation.

See here for the Bagram prisoner list. For a sequence of articles discussing the use of torture in secret prisons, see: Rendered to Egypt for torture, Mohammed Saad Iqbal Madni is released from Guantánamo (September 2008), A History of Music Torture in the “War on Terror” (December 2008), Seven Years of Torture: Binyam Mohamed Tells His Story (March 2009), Ten Terrible Truths About The CIA Torture Memos (Part One), Ten Terrible Truths About The CIA Torture Memos (Part Two) (April 2009), Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi Has Died In A Libyan Prison (May 2009), WORLD EXCLUSIVE: New Revelations About The Torture Of Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi (June 2009), What The British Government Knew About The Torture Of Binyam Mohamed (August 2009), UK Judges Order Release Of Details About The Torture Of Binyam Mohamed By US Agents (October 2009), Dark Revelations in the Bagram Prisoner List (January 2010), UN Secret Detention Report Asks, “Where Are The CIA Ghost Prisoners?” (January 2010), Mohamedou Ould Salahi: How a Judge Demolished the US Government’s Al-Qaeda Claims (April 2010), Judge Rules Yemeni’s Detention at Guantánamo Based Solely on Torture (April 2010), and also see the extensive Binyam Mohamed archive.

The first of these “two very influential judicial bodies” is the European Court of Human Rights, which, as Amnesty explained, “issued an order for interim measures on 13 August 2008 requiring that the Slovak authorities refrain from extraditing Mustapha Labsi until the appeals on his new asylum claim had been completed.”

Labsi’s wife is Slovakian, and he had sought asylum in Slovakia after his earlier imprisonment in the UK and France. He was held in the UK until 2006, when he was extradited to France. There he was tried and sentenced to six years in prison after being linked to an attempted attack on an international summit in Lille in 1996. However, he was deemed to have served out his sentence whilst awaiting extradition in the UK and was again released from custody, but after making his way to Slovakia, in the hope of being reunited with his wife and his young son (even though his long detention had led to the breakdown of his marriage and the collapse of his wife’s mental health), he was imprisoned again, in May 2007, following an extradition request by the Algerian government. Despite this, he lodged a claim for asylum in Slovakia, but this was rejected in October 2008 and again in October 2009 on appeal to the regional court in Bratislava. He then fled from a refugee camp to Austria in December 2009 and was returned to Slovakia on March 11, 2010.

The second influential body that weighed in to prevent Labsi’s expulsion is the Constitutional Court of Slovakia, which, in June 2008, concluded that a previous Supreme Court decision allowing his extradition “would violate his human rights.” The Constitutional Court, as Amnesty explained, “reaffirmed the absolute duty of the Slovak authorities not to return people to countries where they face a real risk of torture or other ill-treatment.”

As a result, the Supreme Court reconsidered Labsi’s case and accepted the Constitutional Court’s verdict in August 2008, noting that Labsi faced the risk of torture and other ill-treatment, despite “diplomatic assurances,” arranged between the Slovakian and Algerian authorities, which purported to guarantee his humane treatment. I have covered the dangers of “diplomatic assurances,” in the context of the UK’s attempts to circumvent the UN Convention Against Torture, in a number of articles (see, for example, “Abu Qatada: Law Lords and Government Endorse Torture,” examining Britain’s “Memorandum of Understanding” with Jordan and its even less binding unwritten agreement with Algeria), and am pleased to recommend Amnesty International’s report, issued earlier this month, entitled, “Dangerous Deals: Europe’s Reliance on ‘Diplomatic Assurances’ Against Torture” (PDF), which features a section on Mustapha Labsi’s case.

Despite these rulings, however, when the Slovakian Supreme Court rejected Labsi’s final appeal regarding his asylum claim on March 30, the government stepped in to deport him, even though his lawyer was preparing to file a claim with the Constitutional Court seeking clarification of his status, and even though, on April 16, the European Court of Human Rights notified his legal representative, Maria Kolikova, that its August 2008 order “would remain in effect until Mustapha Labsi had the opportunity to file a claim with the Constitutional Court and that claim was ruled upon.”

Describing the circumstances of his return to Algeria, Amnesty also explained:

His lawyers and family members were not notified of the expulsion and Mustapha Labsi had no opportunity to challenge the decision of the Ministry of Interior to return him to Algeria. The Slovak Minister of Interior was reported to have justified the breach of the European Court’s order by invoking national security and claiming that the penalty for such a violation was only a “couple of thousand euros”.

In response, Maria Kolikova stated, “This justification amounts to incitement to a violation of a court decision”, and as Amnesty also noted, “In further defiance of the authority of the European Court, the Slovak authorities failed to inform the European Court of Mustapha Labsi’s expulsion, never mind its intention to do so.” The Court was only notified of Labsi’s expulsion by his legal representatives.

On Thursday, the Chairpersons of two Committees of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) expressed their shock and concern at the expulsion, which, as they noted, ignored the European Court’s interim measure, which was binding on the Slovakian government. Christos Pourgourides, the Chair of PACE’s Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights, and John Greenway, the Chair of the Committee on Migration, Refugees and Population, said, “It is disgraceful to have extradited Mustapha Labsi to Algeria; this is a case in which there exists an imminent risk of irreparable damage to the applicant. Such action directly undermines the authority of the Strasbourg Court at a time when all member states have just reiterated their attachment to the Court. This is an unacceptable disregard of European Convention on Human Rights requirements.”

Amnesty International is concerned about Mustapha Labsi’s fate in Algeria, because he was sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment for “membership in a radical Islamist network,” and because the Algerian security service (the Département du renseignement et de la sécurité, or DRS) has a fearsome reputation for torture, which makes the “diplomatic assurances” signed by Slovakia, the UK and other countries — or variations on these “assurances” — absolutely worthless.

As Amnesty explained in its report on “diplomatic assurances”:

Such unreliable promises, made outside the international multilateral treaty regime that was created specifically to bind governments in a global effort to prevent torture, undermine the absolute ban on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, which includes the prohibition against sending persons back to places where they are at risk of such abuse (the non-refoulement obligation) … International and national human rights non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have spoken virtually with one voice against reliance on diplomatic assurances against torture, largely based on reliable field research in many countries where torture is practiced …

[G]overnments are using diplomatic assurances in their own self-interest to rid themselves of foreigners alleged to be involved in acts of terrorism, instead of prosecuting those persons for any crimes of which they are accused. But under international law, the ban on torture and other ill-treatment, including sending a person to a place where he or she is at risk of such abuse, is absolute: the status of the person or crimes he or she might be suspected of committing is simply irrelevant and cannot be taken into consideration in assessing the risk.

It is too late now for Mustapha Labsi, but Amnesty’s analysis is absolutely correct. Whatever Mustapha Labsi and other terror suspects are alleged to have done, the solution is not for European governments to undermine their commitment to the absolute prohibition on torture through worthless agreements with states that routinely use torture, but rather to find ways to “prosecut[e] those persons for any crimes of which they are accused.”

To take action for Mustapha Labsi, please visit this page.

(‘’)

Andy Worthington is the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by Macmillan in the US, and available from Amazon — click on the following for the US and the UK). To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to my RSS feed (and I can also be found on Facebook and Twitter). Also see my definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, updated in January 2010, details about the new documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (co-directed by Polly Nash and Andy Worthington, and currently on tour in the UK), and, if you appreciate my work, feel free to make a donation.

For other articles dealing with Belmarsh, control orders, deportation bail, deportations and extraditions, see Deals with dictators undermined by British request for return of five Guantánamo detainees (August 2007), Britain’s Guantánamo: the troubling tale of Tunisian Belmarsh detainee Hedi Boudhiba, extradited, cleared and abandoned in Spain (August 2007), Guantánamo as house arrest: Britain’s law lords capitulate on control orders (November 2007), The Guantánamo Britons and Spain’s dubious extradition request (December 2007), Britain’s Guantánamo: control orders renewed, as one suspect is freed (February 2008), Spanish drop “inhuman” extradition request for Guantánamo Britons (March 2008), UK government deports 60 Iraqi Kurds; no one notices (March 2008), Repatriation as Russian Roulette: Will the Two Algerians Freed from Guantánamo Be Treated Fairly? (July 2008), Abu Qatada: Law Lords and Government Endorse Torture (February 2009), Ex-Guantánamo prisoner refused entry into UK, held in deportation centre (February 2009), Home Secretary ignores Court decision, kidnaps bailed men and imprisons them in Belmarsh (February 2009), Britain’s insane secret terror evidence (March 2009), Torture taints all our lives (published in the Guardian’s Comment is free), Britain’s Guantánamo: Calling For An End To Secret Evidence, Five Stories From Britain’s Guantánamo: (1) Detainee Y, Five Stories From Britain’s Guantánamo: (2) Detainee BB, Five Stories From Britain’s Guantánamo: (3) Detainee U, Five Stories From Britain’s Guantánamo: (4) Hussain Al-Samamara, Five Stories From Britain’s Guantánamo: (5) Detainee Z, Britain’s Guantánamo: Fact or Fiction? and URGENT APPEAL on British terror laws: Get your MP to support Diane Abbott’s Early Day Motion on the use of secret evidence (all April 2009), and Taking liberties with our justice system and Death in Libya, betrayal in the West (both for the Guardian), Law Lords Condemn UK’s Use of Secret Evidence And Control Orders (June 2009), Miliband Shows Leadership, Reveals Nothing About Torture To Parliamentary Committee (June 2009), Britain’s Torture Troubles: What Tony Blair Knew (June 2009), Seven years of madness: the harrowing tale of Mahmoud Abu Rideh and Britain’s anti-terror laws, Would you be able to cope?: Letters by the children of control order detainee Mahmoud Abu Rideh, Control order detainee Mahmoud Abu Rideh to be allowed to leave the UK (all June 2009), Testing control orders and Dismantle the secret state (for the Guardian), UK government issues travel document to control order detainee Mahmoud Abu Rideh after horrific suicide attempt (July 2009), Secret evidence in the case of the North West 10 “terror suspects” (August 2009), Letting go of control orders (for the Guardian, September 2009), Another Blow To Britain’s Crumbling Control Order Regime (September 2009), UK Judge Approves Use of Secret Evidence in Guantánamo Case (November 2009), Calling Time On The Use Of Secret Evidence In The UK (December 2009), Compensation for control orders is a distraction (for the Guardian, January 2010), Control Orders Take Another Blow: Libyan Cartoonist Freed (Detainee DD) (January 2010), Control Orders: Solicitors’ Evidence before the Joint Committee on Human Rights, February 3, 2010 and Control Orders: Special Advocates’ Evidence before the Joint Committee on Human Rights, February 3, 2010 (both February 2010), Will Parliament Rid Us of the Cruel and Unjust Control Order Regime? (February 2010), Don’t renew control orders, CAMPACC, JUSTICE and the Joint Committee on Human Rights tell MPs (February 2010), Fahad Hashmi and Terrorist Hysteria in US Courts (April 2010).

His lawyers at Reprieve, the London-based legal action charity, explained that no lawyer was appointed to defend him at the trial, and that, despite “repeated requests and extensive investigation,” they had been unable to discover what he was supposed to have done. No evidence was produced to support his conviction, and they concluded that it “appears to be retaliation against Ahmed for speaking out about the inhumane treatment he would be subjected to if sent to Algeria.”

Since 2008, Ahmed has been protected from being forcibly repatriated to Algeria, through an injunction put in place by a US District Court. However, that injunction was dissolved in February. His lawyers immediately asked for the decision to be reversed, citing the fact that the US Supreme Court was, at that time, considering a related case, Kiyemba v Obama (known as Kiyemba II — see here for an explanation), in which the Court of Appeals had ruled that US courts could not prevent the Obama administration from sending prisoners to other countries — including, in theory, the forcible repatriation of prisoners like Ahmed to countries where they face the risk of torture or other ill-treatment.

On March 22, the Supreme Court decided not to review Kiyemba II, hurling Ahmed and other prisoners once more into a dangerously unprotected limbo. Reprieve immediately submitted a plea on his behalf to the District Court, and followed this up with an emergency motion over the Easter weekend, following a visit to Algeria by Attorney General Eric Holder to sign a “mutual legal assistance treaty” with the Algerian Minister of Justice, which raised legitimate fears that Ahmed would soon be repatriated against his will.

On April 20, a judge turned down Ahmed’s plea, and Reprieve immediately repeated its long-standing call for other countries to offer him a new home. In negotiations over the last few months, Reprieve, in conjunction with the Center for Constitutional Rights and Amnesty International, has tried to secure a new home for Ahmed in the UK, Ireland or Luxembourg, but without success. Ironically, the only place to offer him a home is Amherst, Massachusetts, where residents voted last year to take in Ahmed and a Russian prisoner, Ravil Mingazov, but will need to persuade Congress to repeal legislation passed last year preventing the resettlement of any Guantánamo prisoner on the US mainland.

In light of these new developments, the need for another country to offer Ahmed a home is greater than ever — and no country is better suited to accept him than the UK.

As Amnesty International’s UK director Kate Allen explained last week, “It is totally understandable that Ahmed Belbacha is concerned that a new US-Algeria deal could mean he’s sent to Algeria despite the human rights dangers. As with other Guantánamo prisoners, we’re insisting that Mr. Belbacha shouldn’t be exposed to fresh danger by being sent where his human rights may be placed at risk. This is certainly the case with Algeria. And there should be no question of the US and Algerian authorities producing ‘diplomatic assurances’ supposedly guaranteeing safe treatment. These, as we’ve seen in other cases, simply can’t be trusted. As someone who has previously lived in the UK, the best solution is that the UK authorities end the deadlock and uncertainty by offering a safe haven to Mr. Belbacha.”

I encourage readers to write to the foreign secretary David Miliband, asking him to offer Ahmed a new home in the UK. A template for a letter, which also asks the UK to act decisively to secure the release of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in Guantánamo, is available below, for readers to cut and paste and adapt as they see fit:

A letter to David Miliband

David Miliband MP
Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
King Charles Street
London, SW1A 2AH

Dear Foreign Secretary,

You will be aware that, as of 22 January this year, the prison camp at Guantánamo Bay was still open, despite the fact that one of President Obama’s first pledges as President was to close it by this date. 183 prisoners are still held there, and many of those men, cleared for release by the President’s own task Force, cannot be repatriated because of fears that they will be tortured or subjected to other ill-treatment, and are effectively stateless.

The government has succeeded over the past six years in securing the release of all the British nationals held there, and all but one of the British residents. Given our strong relationship with the US, there is far more that the British government could — and should — be doing. You have asserted your commitment to closing Guantánamo Bay, but this has yet to be demonstrated in the case of the final British resident, Shaker Aamer, who was cleared for release from Guantánamo in 2007.

We have been told that the return of Shaker Aamer to his British wife and four British children is being sought, and that discussions between the UK and the US are ongoing. Nevertheless, Shaker is still held, and intervention must be made at the highest levels to secure his release, as happened with other prisoners.

Other European countries have demonstrated over the past year that it is possible to offer new homes to cleared prisoners, even when they have no prior ties to the country. France, for example, having secured the return of its own nationals, accepted two Algerian nationals last year, as well as the family of one of these men, and Albania, Belgium, Hungary, Ireland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain and Switzerland have also accepted prisoners on a purely humanitarian basis. There are no reasons for the British government not to accept a small number of prisoners on a humanitarian basis to help close Guantánamo Bay.

Over the past eight years, for example, you have argued that there is no basis to accept Ahmed Belbacha, an Algerian man who lived in Bournemouth and cannot return to Algeria for fear for his life, because he was a failed asylum seeker. Mr. Belbacha was also cleared for release in 2007, and yet he remains in Guantánamo because no other country will take him, and because the British government, which could so easily offer him a new home, has turned its back on him.

The British government must demonstrate its commitment to democracy, human rights and the rule of law by helping to close down Guantánamo Bay, and it can — and should — do this by pressing for the return of Shaker Aamer, accepting Ahmed Belbacha and accepting other prisoners on a humanitarian basis.

Yours faithfully,

Ahmed’s story (via Reprieve)

Ahmed was born in Algiers in 1969. He comes from a middle class family with eleven children. After high school, Ahmed trained from 1988 to 1989 as an accountant for Algeria’s premier oil company, Sonatrach, where he made an impression as a star player on the company’s famous football team. He was then called up for a term of national service. When he finished, Ahmed returned to Sonatrach for approximately four years (until 1997), working in its commercial division.

Then a fateful turn of events changed Ahmed’s quiet life: he was recalled by the army. Shortly afterwards, the major terrorist group in Algeria — the Groupe Islamique Armé (GIA) — began to threaten Ahmed’s life. The GIA’s stated mission was to overthrow the secular Algerian regime and install an Islamist one in its place. They threatened to murder Ahmed if he rejoined the army, and told him to quit his job at Sonatrach, as it was a government company. These were no empty threats: the GIA were notorious for killing people after their military service, and had carried out violence against Sonatrach employees.

In an effort to lie low Ahmed went to work for his father’s business, rather than returning to Sonatrach. But the threats continued; the GIA visited Ahmed’s family and menaced them as well. Fearing for their safety, Ahmed decided to leave Algeria.

He travelled via France to England, where he headed for Bournemouth and started life as an asylum seeker working in a launderette. He then worked at the Swallow Royal Hotel while the 1999 Labour Party conference was taking place. Ahmed was in charge of cleaning Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott’s room during the conference and received a personal thank you note and a healthy tip from Mr Prescott.

In 2001 Ahmed was invited to the Home Office to discuss his asylum application. Unfortunately, his application for asylum was refused. He appealed, but the procedure dragged on for months. He was having increasing difficulty finding steady work and greatly feared deportation. He decided to travel to Pakistan, where he could take advantage of free educational programs to study the Koran. He hoped after a few months the economy would be better and his job prospects would improve.

Ahmed left the UK for Pakistan with a friend in June 2001. He had a return ticket to come back six months later, to pursue his asylum appeal. After some time in Pakistan, Ahmed’s friend suggested they see what life was like in Afghanistan, a Muslim country. This was well before September 11 and Afghanistan at the time was relatively peaceful.

Ahmed crossed into Afghanistan and spent a few months there in an Algerian guest house. After the US invaded and the Northern Alliance began rounding up Arabs, he realized it was not safe for him to stay. He spent 20 days in the Afghan mountains before being taken to the Pakistani border by Afghans.

Ahmed hoped to reach Islamabad, from where he would fly back home to the UK. He did not make it. After crossing the border from Afghanistan in December 2001, Ahmed was seized in a small village and taken briefly to a border prison. He was then transferred to another prison six or seven hours’ drive away, where he was held for about two weeks and interrogated by the CIA. He was then moved to Kandahar, where he underwent further interrogation and suffered beatings and other physical abuse. In March 2002 he was transferred to Guantánamo. He has remained there ever since.

Meanwhile, in January 2002, while Ahmed was in Guantánamo, his final asylum appeal was denied. The main reason: he did not turn up for the appeal hearing. The appeals judge did not know that Ahmed was a prisoner at the time, as the US kept Guantánamo prisoners’ identities secret.

(‘’)

Andy Worthington is the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by Macmillan in the US, and available from Amazon — click on the following for the US and the UK). To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to my RSS feed (and I can also be found on Facebook and Twitter). Also see my definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, updated in January 2010, details about the new documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (co-directed by Polly Nash and Andy Worthington, and currently on tour in the UK), and, if you appreciate my work, feel free to make a donation.

The trigger for this sudden shifting of legal protections for some of the most vulnerable prisoners in Guantánamo (from countries with notoriously poor human rights records, including Algeria, Libya, Tunisia and Uzbekistan) was the response to a ruling last October, by District Court Judge Ricardo Urbina, after the government (reeling from a shocking court defeat in June) conceded that it could no longer claim that the Uighurs were “enemy combatants.” Judge Urbina ruled that they should be relocated to the US mainland, because the government conceded that it was unsafe to return them to China, because no other country had been found that would accept them, and because continuing to hold them in Guantánamo was unconstitutional.

The government disagreed, and appealed Judge Urbina’s ruling, and when the Court of Appeals came to review the case, a panel of three judges — including Judge A. Raymond Randolph, a man noted for endorsing every Bush administration policy regarding the “War on Terror” that was subsequently overturned by the Supreme Court — reversed Judge Urbina’s ruling, deciding that the courts had no business interfering in immigration policies that were the preserve of the Executive.

The judges were seemingly unmoved that this would leave the Uighurs (and, very possibly, others in Guantánamo) with no means of leaving the prison, and that it stripped the Supreme Court’s ruling in June 2008, granting the prisoners habeas corpus rights, of all practical meaning, if it was not possible for judges to order their release. In the judges’ words, however, “the political branches have the exclusive power … to decide which aliens may, and which aliens may not, enter the United States, and on what terms.”

In response to the ruling, the Uighurs’ lawyers filed a petition with the Supreme Court (a writ of certiorari, essentially a petition asking for a judicial review). A date in June was set for a hearing, amid fears from the lawyers that the government would find other countries to take the Uighurs before that date, so that the Supreme Court could be persuaded not to review the Circuit Court’s ruling, and to rule on whether it was indeed acceptable that the Executive should be able to gut the lower courts’ habeas rulings of all meaning by refusing to allow judges to order the prisoners’ release.

In the end, the government managed only to dispose of four of the Uighurs before the deadline (sending them to Bermuda), but the Supreme Court then decided to refrain from hearing the case until October, perhaps to give the government time to resolve the issue itself.

This case, Kiyemba v. Bush (which became Kiyemba v. Obama) is now known as “Kiyemba I,” because, in response to the ruling by the Court of Appeals, the Uighurs’ lawyers submitted an appeal on their clients’ behalf, also filed as Kiyemba v. Obama, and now known as “Kiyemba II.” In the brief, they asked the Court of Appeals to reconsider its opinion en banc (in other words, with all the judges ruling, instead of just a panel of three), and also sought assurances that the courts would be able to act if the government proposed sending their clients to countries where they faced the risk of torture.

However, not only did the court refuse to reconsider its ruling, but the judges also refused the Uighurs’ request for the court’s assistance “to prevent their transfer to a country where they are likely to be subjected to further detention or to torture” (PDF), drawing on Munaf v. Geren, a case from 2008 in which “two American citizens held in the custody of the United States military in Iraq petitioned for writs of habeas corpus, seeking to enjoin the Government from transferring them to Iraqi custody for criminal prosecution in the Iraqi courts.”

In Munaf, although “The Court held the district court had jurisdiction over the petitions,” it also ruled that “it could not enjoin the Government from transferring the petitioners to Iraqi custody,” because “that concern is to be addressed by the political branches, not the judiciary.”

The court added that strenuous efforts had been made by the US government not to transfer prisoners to countries where they might face torture, and “The upshot is that the detainees are not liable to be cast around willy-nilly without regard to their likely treatment in any country that will take them,” but in any case, as the judges also explained, “the district court may not question the Government’s determination that a potential recipient country is not likely to torture a detainee,” because “The judiciary is not suited to second-guess such determinations.”

With that decision, effectively, the case was lost. The Uighurs’ lawyers announced their intention to appeal this second ruling to the Supreme Court, and it is currently anticipated that the Supreme Court will address both “Kiyemba I” and “Kiyemba II” sometime next month.

However, the fallout from the Court of Appeals’ insistence that no court is empowered to prevent the government from sending prisoners wherever it wishes has had a disturbing knock-on effect on other cases (as many as 150 of the remaining 225 prisoners, according to SCOTUSblog), in which lawyers have, since 2005, persuaded the courts to order the government to provide 30 days’ notice in advance of any proposed transfer, and, in some cases, including that of Ahmed Belbacha, an Algerian who had lived in the UK, have secured injunctions preventing any attempt to repatriate their clients.

Belbacha’s case is, in many ways, emblematic of the issues at stake. Although he was cleared for release from Guantánamo by a military review board in February 2007, he is terrified of returning to Algeria, where he fears persecution both by the government and by the Islamists whose threats forced him to flee his homeland in the first place. His case has attracted widespread support from human rights organizations, and has also received international media coverage.

Since the Court of Appeals made its ruling in “Kiyemba II,” lawyers have been aware that the 30-day notices and injunctions were under threat, but it was not until September 8, when the court issued its mandate regarding “Kiyemba II”, which formally implements its ruling, that the way was paved for the government, if it wishes, to lawfully repatriate prisoners who, like Belbacha, would rather remain in Guantánamo than return home.

As a result, Belbacha’s lawyers have filed a motion with the Court of Appeals asking the judges “to hold this case in abeyance pending the Supreme Court’s disposition of a petition for certiorari that the petitioners in Kiyemba intend to file.” The judges may well respond by reiterating that they are secure in assurances from the government that “the detainees are not liable to be cast around willy-nilly without regard to their likely treatment in any country that will take them,” but with just four months to go until the deadline is reached for Obama’s promised closure of Guantánamo, it is, I believe, legitimate to entertain fears that the administration may wish to repatriate cleared prisoners to countries it regards as safe (following “intense diplomatic negotiations,” or some such explanation), but which the prisoners and their lawyers still regard as a profound threat.

Andy Worthington is the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by Macmillan in the US, and available from Amazon — click on the following for the US and the UK). To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to my RSS feed. Also see my definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, published in March 2009, and if you appreciate my work, feel free to make a donation.

As published exclusively on the website of the Future of Freedom Foundation. Cross-posted on The Public Record.

Now imagine that, instead of being freed, you continued to be held because the government refused to send you home, stating that it would not release you unless you first passed through a rehabilitation center in your home country, or, preferably, in a third country.

You would, I think, be pretty depressed about your situation, and would conclude that the United States’ much-vaunted justice system was a farce. And yet, this is exactly the problem that currently faces Alla Ali Bin Ali Ahmed, a Yemeni prisoner in Guantánamo, whose habeas corpus petition was granted in May by Judge Gladys Kessler.

Yesterday, the Associated Press reported that, although “The government’s deadline for appealing Ahmed’s release has run out,” he continues to be held because the of the government’s refusal to send him home without first putting him through a rehabilitation center, preferably in Saudi Arabia, which, unlike its impoverished neighbor, has established rehabilitation centers that have processed thousands of former and would-be jihadists in the last few years, including dozens of Saudi prisoners repatriated from Guantánamo (some of whom, it should be noted, were not in Afghanistan to fight for the Taliban, but had visited as missionaries or charity workers).

In the AP’s report, the US government’s refusal to free Ali Ahmed outright was dressed up as part of a wider policy on the government’s part to put an unspecified number of the remaining 100 or so Yemeni prisoners, “who officials say probably will be freed,” through a rehabilitation center “before they are released to make sure they pose no threat to Americans.”

However, in the case of Ali Ahmed, and two other Yemeni prisoners — Yasim Basardah, whose habeas petition was granted in March, and Ayman Batarfi, a doctor whose release was approved by the government’s own Detention Policy Task Force at the same time — this makes no sense, as either the courts or the government itself have already concluded that they “pose no threat to Americans.”

These cases are not the only examples of inexplicable obstruction on the part of the administration. Although 15 other prisoners cleared by the courts — 13 Uighurs, Sabir Lahmar, an Algerian, and Abdul Rahim al-Ginco, a Syrian — are awaiting new homes, because of fears that they will face torture — or worse — if returned to their homelands, the government has also approved “more than 50” other prisoners for release, after their cases were reviewed by the inter-departmental Detention Policy Task Force (established by Executive Order on Obama’s second day in office), which, as ABC News explained, has, for the last six months, involved 65 representatives “from agencies like the FBI, Pentagon, the CIA, and attorneys from the Justice Department” meeting up once a week “on a secure floor within a secure facility to discuss the review.”

Sadly, in a demonstration of the executive secrecy that was such a hallmark of the Bush administration, officials in the Obama administration have not revealed the identities of any of these men (other than Ayman Batarfi, Binyam Mohamed, the British resident who was hastily released in February to avoid a Transatlantic torture scandal, and Umar Abdulayev, a Tajik, cleared in June, who was seized by opportunistic Pakistani intelligence agents from a refugee camp), but it seems, from the limited information made available — rumors that three Tunisians will be transferred to Italy and that some Tunisians and Algerians will be rehoused in Spain, and the recent news that Belgium will take some prisoners and Ireland will accept two Uzbeks — that the decisions on who to release correspond broadly with those made by military review boards at Guantánamo under the Bush administration.

Although hundreds of the 544 prisoners freed from Guantánamo were released after military review boards concluded that they no longer posed a threat to the United States and/or no longer had ongoing intelligence value, 58 of these prisoners were still held when George W. Bush left office, even though some had been approved for release in 2006. Excluding the Uighurs (four of whom were finally released in Bermuda in June) and three Saudis released in the same month (see here and here), this leaves a total of 38 prisoners still at Guantánamo whose transfer from Guantánamo was approved by the Bush administration.

20 of these men — five Algerians, an Egyptian, a Libyan, eight Tunisians, four Uzbeks and Umar Abdulayev, who was cleared for release under George W. Bush before this decision was repeated by Obama’s Task Force — could not be repatriated by the Bush administration because of fears that they would be tortured on their return, and three are Palestinians, and are therefore effectively stateless, as the Israeli government has no desire to facilitate their return.

However, there appears to be no good reason why the remaining 15 men could not be repatriated tomorrow. Three are Saudis, and the other 12 are Yemenis, and, just to reiterate, in case anyone missed it the first time round, some of these men were approved for transfer from Guantánamo over three years ago.

I don’t mean to complain unnecessarily, but when the government has a genuine problem finding homes for at least 35 prisoners cleared for release by the Bush administration, by the US courts, or by its own Detention Policy Task Force, it seems inexplicable that 18 others — also cleared for release by either the Bush administration, the courts or Obama’s Task Force — cannot simply be flown home tomorrow, bringing to an end this farcical situation in which, as my Hotel California analogy was meant to signify, prisoners who do not face ill-treatment on their return to their homelands are still held no matter how many times their release is approved by various representatives of the US government.

Andy Worthington is the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by Macmillan in the US, and available from Amazon — click on the following for the US and the UK). To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to my RSS feed, and also see my definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, published in March 2009.

As published on the Huffington Post, Antiwar.com, CounterPunch and AlterNet. Cross-posted on Common Dreams and uruknet.

For a sequence of articles dealing with the Guantánamo habeas cases, see: Guantánamo and the Supreme Court: the most important habeas corpus case in modern history and Guantánamo and the Supreme Court: What Happened? (both December 2007), The Supreme Court’s Guantánamo ruling: what does it mean? (June 2008), Guantánamo as Alice in Wonderland (Uighurs’ first court victory, June 2008), What’s Happening with the Guantánamo cases? (July 2008), Government Says Six Years Is Not Long Enough To Prepare Evidence (September 2008), From Guantánamo to the United States: The Story of the Wrongly Imprisoned Uighurs (October 2008), Guantánamo Uyghurs’ resettlement prospects skewered by Justice Department lies (October 2008), Guilt By Torture: Binyam Mohamed’s Transatlantic Quest for Justice (November 2008), After 7 Years, Judge Orders Release of Guantánamo Kidnap Victims (November 2008), Is Robert Gates Guilty of Perjury in Guantánamo Torture Case? (December 2008), A New Year Message to Barack Obama: Free the Guantánamo Uighurs (January 2009), The Top Ten Judges of 2008 (January 2009), No End in Sight for the “Enemy Combatants” of Guantánamo (January 2009), Judge Orders Release of Guantánamo’s Forgotten Child (January 2009), How Cooking For The Taliban Gets You Life In Guantánamo (January 2009), Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics (February 2009), Bad News And Good News For The Guantánamo Uighurs (February 2009), The Nobodies Formerly Known As Enemy Combatants (March 2009), Farce at Guantánamo, as cleared prisoner’s habeas petition is denied (April 2009), Obama’s First 100 Days: A Start On Guantánamo, But Not Enough (May 2009), Judge Condemns “Mosaic” Of Guantánamo Intelligence, And Unreliable Witnesses (May 2009), Pain At Guantánamo And Paralysis In Government (May 2009), Guantánamo: A Prison Built On Lies (May 2009), Free The Guantánamo Uighurs! (May 2009), Guantánamo And The Courts (Part One): Exposing The Bush Administration’s Lies (July 2009), Obama’s Failure To Deliver Justice To The Last Tajik In Guantánamo (July 2009), Obama And The Deadline For Closing Guantánamo: It’s Worse Than You Think (July 2009), How Judge Huvelle Humiliated The Government In Guantánamo Case (Mohamed Jawad, July 2009), As Judge Orders Release Of Tortured Guantánamo Prisoner, Government Refuses To Concede Defeat (Mohamed Jawad, July 2009), Judge Orders Release From Guantánamo Of Kuwaiti Charity Worker (August 2009). Also see: Justice extends to Bagram, Guantánamo’s Dark Mirror (April 2009), Judge Rules That Afghan “Rendered” To Bagram In 2002 Has No Rights (July 2009).