N.J. man alleges FBI torture threat in Kenyan jail

WASHINGTON — An American Muslim who was captured while fleeing Somalia in 2007 accused two FBI agents and two other U.S. officials Tuesday of illegally interrogating him and threatening torture while he was allegedly held at U.S. behest in Kenyan and Ethiopian jails.

In a lawsuit filed on behalf of Amir Meshal of Tinton Falls, N.J., the American Civil Liberties Union alleged that he'd been held in "stark and inhuman conditions" and had "suffered physical injuries, pain and suffering, severe mental anguish, as well as loss of income and livelihood."

U.S. officials "threatened Mr. Meshal with serious physical and mental abuse, told him he would be made to 'disappear,' and denied him access to counsel and other due process protections," said the lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court.

Jonathan Hafetz, an ACLU attorney, said his client is seeking unspecified damages. An FBI spokesman declined to discuss the case because it's an active lawsuit.

A series of McClatchy reports at the time raised questions about whether the Bush administration asked the Kenyan and Ethiopian governments to hold Meshal for interrogation about alleged terrorist links.

The lawsuit named FBI agents named Chris Higgenbotham and Steve Hersem as taking part in the interrogations. Both were identified during a hearing in 2007 for Daniel Maldonado, a Texas resident who was arrested on the Somalia-Kenya border around the same time as Meshal and pleaded guilty to receiving military-style training from a foreign terrorist organization.

The lawsuit also named two U.S. officials identified only as "Tim" and "Dennis." "Tim" participated in interrogations of Meshal was in Kenya and Ethiopia; and "Dennis" questioned Meshal in Ethiopia, it said.

The lawsuit accused the defendants of violating Meshal's right to due process and his constitutional protections against illegal detention and breaking a U.S. law banning torture "in an effort to coerce him into confessing that he was connected to and/or supported al Qaida."

Meshal repeatedly denied the allegation and has never been charged with any crime since his return to the U.S. on May 26, 2007.

Meshal was captured in late January 2007 by Kenyan border guards as he fled Somalia after Ethiopia invaded Somalia.

The lawsuit said that during two weeks of incarceration, Meshal was removed from his Kenyan jail, taken to a private guesthouse and interrogated at least three times by Hersem, Higgenbotham and "Tim."

Meshal was coerced into signing waivers of his rights, denied a lawyer and told that unless he confessed to links with al Qaida, he'd be sent for interrogation to Egypt, turned over to Israel, where he'd "disappear," or returned to war-torn Somalia, the lawsuit said.

After a Muslim human rights group learned of his incarceration without charges and filed a lawsuit seeking his release, Kenyan authorities flew Meshal back to Somalia and turned him over to Ethiopian officials. They held him in Addis Ababa for more than three months without charges.

Meshal was regularly questioned by "Tim" and "Dennis" while in Ethiopian custody, but was never interrogated by Ethiopian officials, the lawsuit said.

The plaintiff was told that "his truthfulness now would determine if he would ever go home," according to the lawsuit.

Meshal was allowed to speak to a U.S. consular official only after a McClatchy report disclosed that he was being detained without charges in Ethiopia. After his congressman, Rep. Rush Holt, D-N.J, intervened in the case, he was released and never charged.

Source: McClatchy

Guantanamo conditions 'deteriorate'

Some prisoners say conditions have deteriorated at Guantanamo Bay this year [GALLO/GETTY]

On the night that Barack Obama won the 2008 presidential election, 21-year-old Mohammed el Gharani was sitting in a segregation cell in Guantanamo Bay's high security Echo Block.

He remembers the excitement among his fellow prisoners at the prospect of an Obama presidency. "Everyone was very hopeful; people were saying he was going to change things, that he would close the prison," Gharani, who was released in June, says.

"Even the guards were telling us that if he won, things would improve for us."

They were to be disappointed. A year after Obama's election win, Al Jazeera has learnt that despite the new president's pledge to close the prison and improve the conditions of detainees held by the US military, prisoners believe that their treatment has deteriorated on his watch.      

Authorities at the prison deny mistreating the inmates, but interviews with former detainees, letters from current prisoners and sworn testimony from independent medical experts who have visited the prison have painted a disturbing picture of psychological and physical abuse very much at odds with White House rhetoric on prisoner treatment.   

While no-one is alleging a return to the early days of the prison, when detainees were subjected to "enhanced interrogation" techniques that are today widely regarded as torture, prisoners say day-to-day life at Guantanamo has become harder under the Obama administration.

Within days of Obama's inauguration and subsequent announcement that he would close Guantanamo, prisoners say authorities introduced new regulations and revoked previous privileges at the prison.

"They took away group recreation for prisoners in segregation, which was the only time we saw anyone," Gharani remembers. "They took away the books we had from the library. They even sprayed pepper spray into my cell while I was sleeping, so I'd wake up unable to breathe."

Gharani says he was beaten so badly by guards that he is still suffering pain today.

'Humiliating rules'

Al Jazeera has obtained letters written by those currently being held in Guantanamo that tell a similar story. In one, written in March, a prisoner, who has asked that he remains anonymous for fear of repercussions, says he is writing to "depict to what degree our conditions inside Guantanamo detention have deteriorated" since Obama took office.   

"I am in the very same cell, wearing the same uniform, eating the same food, yet treated much worse compared to mid-2008," the prisoner writes. "We are unable to understand the goals of the policy of more restrictions and inflexibility."

Letters describe 'fading hopes' [GALLO/GETTY]
According to the letter, prison authorities inflict "humiliating punishments" on inmates and prisoners face "intentional mental and physical harm".

"The situation is worsening with the advent of the new management," the prisoner writes, noting, like Gharani, that the new rules were imposed in January this year. Conditions, he says, "do not fit the lowest standard of human living".

Separately, two prisoners have complained to their lawyer that their belongings, including their bedding, were removed from their cells on several occasions for no reason. Each time, they were told that the removal was a "mistake," and the belongings were returned, only to be confiscated again.   

More disturbingly, the same two prisoners say that during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, their recreation time was moved to prevent them from taking part in traditional group prayer.

Using religion to punish prisoners is illegal under international law. Authorities at Guantanamo deny the prisoners are kept from practising their religion, although they concede that recreation times are sometimes moved "due to operational needs".

They say that personal belongings are not removed from cells "unless detainees misuse the items"; the prisoners categorically deny that they did so.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), which monitors prisoner treatment at Guantanamo, declined to comment on specific allegations at the prison, but says that it recognises the cumulative effect low-level abuse can have on the well-being of prisoners in general.

"In some cases, a single act may amount to torture," ICRC spokesman Simon Schorno says. "In others, ill treatment may be the result of a number of methods used over time, which, taken individually and out of context, may seem harmless."

Hunger strikes

For the Guantanamo prisoners, avenues of protest against their treatment are limited and many have resorted to hunger strikes. Now there is concern that the force-feeding regime to which hunger strikers are subjected is having a detrimental effect on their mental and physical health.

Abdul Rahman Shalabi has been on hunger strike since August 2005. He has been force-fed twice a day by Guantanamo personnel, who insert a feeding tube through his nose in order to administer a liquid diet aimed at keeping him alive.

TBC...

Skip, there's plenty of cases of actual torture occurring. The article was more about showing the culture of American intelligence services hasn't changed a bit. They still harass people all around the world and use threatening methods like this.

Quote:


Do you have any example of the Talibaan torturing anyone? If not, mere suggestions don't really mean much.

jordan,

I'd certainly take them with a little more than a pinch of salt.

And they'd at least add some credibility to the statement in the eyes of others, rather than just appearing like an empty claim...

The point here is not what weight I'd give to them, the point is that making such statements require evidence to be given.

Good excuse for failing to provide evidence.