Detainee al Hilah in Fear for His Life after Assassination Attempt at Guantanamo
Its a very odd story all in all.
الإثنين 03 أغسطس-آب 2009 / Radhia Khairan-Edit: Jane Novak
HOOD OnlineIn his second call home in a matter of months, Abdulsalam al Hilah, a Yemeni detainee incarcerated at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility, said he survived an assassination attempt three weeks ago.
During the call to his family in Yemen last month, Mr. al Hilah received the news of the death of his mother and two young sons. The boys were killed in April 2009 just two days after Mr. al Hilah’s last call home when a grenade accidentally exploded.
Al-Hilah is concerned that he may be murdered in prison and listed as a suicide. “My suicide could easily be justified that I was in a bad psychic damaging after receiving the news of the deaths of my mother, brother and two sons of mine; do not believe this because it does not affect my morale. It did not even disrupt my daily program, and I want you to know that all these incidents increase my rigidity more,” Al Hilah said during last Thursday call with his family. HOOD has the record. The International Committee of the Red Cross facilitated the call.
Mr. al Hilah’s lawyer David Remes traveled to the detention facility after receiving an urgent message from Mr. Hilah two weeks ago, but is unable to divulge the details of the meeting until the U.S. government clears his notes. Mr. Remes said his client is in fear for his life and told him “disturbing and alarming” information. Mr. Remes told HOOD that he notified the camp authority, but based on Mr. Hilah’s call, it seems that “they are not taking the matter seriously”.
Despite the Obama administration’s determination to close the Guantanamo prison, the US and Yemeni governments are at an impasse regarding the repatriation of Yemeni detainees. “Both governments are to blame,” according to Remes. He urged each government to “drop its conditions and send the men home, before it is too late.” Yemeni detainees now comprise more than forty percent of the prison population, and Remes predicts, “More Yemenis will die if they are not sent home promptly.”
Expressing frustration at the diplomatic stalemate, Al Hilah said, “it seems that it is because of this the U.S. government decides to repatriate us in coffins…If they want us bodies, they could have us excused by an open verdict before the eyes of the whole world; not to kill us and then said they killed themselves, this is what we want the world to understand.”
Al Hilah’s accusations follow the announcement that the cause of death of another Yemeni detainee listed as a suicide. Mohammad Ahmed Abdullah Saleh Al Hanashi (Wadah Mohammed Moqbel) died June 1 in the psychiatric ward. Saleh, 31, was detained for seven years and said he fought for the Taliban. He was transferred to the psychiatric ward several months before his death. Saleh died from asphyxiation, a Yemeni government spokesman said, based on initial US reports.
Weighing 100 pounds due to a hunger strike, Saleh took sleeping medication on the night he died and was found unresponsive during a bed check an hour later, according to the AP. It was the fifth apparent suicide at Guantanamo since 2002 and the second Yemeni. The Naval Criminal Investigative Service is investigating the death.
Mr. Remes finds the contention that Saleh strangled himself “unbelievable,” pointing to constant monitoring and the presence of cameras in the Behavioral Health Unit. Mr. Hilah also doubts that Saleh committed suicide, stating he knew Saleh well.
“We are political hostages and the state officials should understand that they must pay whatever costs to save us,” al Hilah urged during his recent call. He expressed surprise that the Yemeni government requested funds from the US to facilitate the transfer. “If the matter is all about money,” al Hilah said, “the officials should be ashamed and they could collect it from the Yemeni business personalities, but if it is due to some interests that damage Yemen, we sacrifice our lives to first our religion and then our homeland”.
Al Hilah was a high ranking intelligence agent in Yemen’s Political Security Organization beginning in the 1990’s. Apprehended on a business trip in Cairo, Egyptian authorities claim that they handed al Hilah to the US authorities immediately after his capture in 2002. He spent 16 months in US custody in Afghanistan and was transferred to Guantanamo Bay in 2004.
According to his 2006 Administrative Review Board Hearing, al Hilah admitted coordinating the transfer of extremists from Yemen to Afghanistan and Pakistan, under the cover of deportation, for training with al Qaeda. Other extremists were sent by al Hilah from Yemen to Europe according to a foreign government service. The US also alleges that conversations recorded by Italian police in 2000 indicate al Hilal had prior knowledge of the September 11, 2001 terror attacks on the United States. On the tape, al Hilah discusses an impending “terrifying” attack that will involve airplanes, “leave them stunned” and “be reported in all the world’s papers.”
At his Combat Status Review Tribunal, Al Hilah denied that he was a terror facilitator or had provided passports for al Qaeda or Egyptian Islamic Jihad, and he stated he had no foreknowledge of the 9/11 attacks. He said he had nothing but loathing for terrorism as a whole.
Regarding his client and the other Yemenis at Guantanamo Bay, attorney Remes says, “We’re talking about fewer than 100 men. It can’t be that hard to arrange for their return.” Concerned about lax security conditions in Yemen, the US raised the possibility of sending the Yemeni detainees to Saudi Arabia for rehabilitation, an idea widely decried within Yemen and by President Ali Abdullah Saleh. US allies have largely rejected US requests to take some Yemeni detainees. Some estimates of the cost of developing a modern rehabilitation program in Yemen range over USD 100 million.
