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Washington Didn't Want You to See this Guantanamo Photo
Star journalist captures landmark protest hours before a suicide puts heat on Obama
WASHINGTON - A Guantanamo Bay detainee committed suicide late Monday just hours after two Chinese Muslim captives staged the detention centre's first public protest, increasing the pressure on U.S. President Barack Obama to outline his plan of how he will close the offshore prison.
Two Uighur detainees at Guantanamo hold the prison camp's first self-styled public protest for visiting journalists Monday night in this photo cleared for release by the U.S. Department of Defense. ( MICHELLE SHEPHARD/TORONTO STAR) Yemeni Muhammad Ahmad Abdallah Salih, 31, is the first prisoner to die since the White House changed hands four months ago. His suicide follows weeks of criticism from both ends of the political spectrum over the fate of the remaining 240 Guantanamo detainees.
News of the suicide was emailed to the media just as a flight bringing journalists from Guantanamo landed in Maryland. The press had been at the U.S. naval detention centre for the war crimes court hearing of Canadian Omar Khadr.
Khadr, 22, is accused of war crimes, including the murder of a U.S. soldier during a firefight in Afghanistan in July 2002.
Hours after Khadr's brief hearing Monday, fewer than a dozen journalists on the trip, including a Toronto Star reporter, witnessed a rare unscripted moment on the base when two Uighur (pronounced Wee-gur) detainees managed to hold an impromptu protest.
The group was at an Oceanside prison known as "Camp Iguana," where 16 Uighur and one Algerian detainee are imprisoned.
As the journalists neared the fence line, the captives held up messages written in crayon on prison-issued sketch pads, knowing the Pentagon prohibits journalists from speaking to detainees.
For a few minutes they silently turned the pages quickly, as journalists shot video, photos and scribbled down their messages.
"We are being held in prison but we have been announced innocent a corrding to the virdict in caurt," one message said. "We need to freedom (sic)."
Another stated, "America is Double Hetler in unjustice," seemingly comparing their treatment by the U.S. government to that of the Nazis.
The Uighur prisoners with Chinese citizenship have been cleared for release but there's nowhere for them to go since the minority group is persecuted in its Communist-controlled homeland. The U.S. government has tried for months to find a country willing to provide the group asylum.
Reporters were ushered away from the fenced-in area shortly after the Uighurs had their written protest. One of the captives yelled as the gate was locked behind the group: "Is Obama Communist or a Democrat? We have the same operation in China."
Journalists were later forbidden from sending photos or video footage of the signs until Guantanamo officials received clearance from the White House - which didn't come until about 14 hours later.
Pentagon ground rules signed by reporters stipulate that images of detainees must be pre-screened and cannot identify the captives due to regulations in the Geneva Conventions prohibiting the exploitation of prisoners of war.
Hours after the protest guards found Salih unresponsive in his cell in a separate area of the prison and attempts to revive him failed.
He had been held without charges at Guantanamo since February 2002 and appeared to have joined a lengthy hunger strike, according to medical records released in response to an Associated Press lawsuit.
Three detainee suicides in June 2006 under the George W. Bush administration drew international outrage, further fuelled by comments about the military's reaction.
"They have no regard for human life, neither ours nor their own," then-Guantanamo commander Rear Adm. Harry Harris Jr. said. "I believe this was not an act of desperation but an act of asymmetric warfare against us."
56 Comments so far
Show AllI don't know about others exactly and how they feel, but given what I now know about our own government, these 'worst of the worst' are looking more and more like the most 'heroic of heroes'. This era's version of the grim survivors (and non-survivors) of Germany's concentration camps.
I am so digusted by this country. Words cannot express the revulsion I have for our 'leaders' and their controllers--the corporate megalomaniacs.
Every honest poor young soldier who fought, survived, was wounded or killed fighting Hitler's fascism and evil is being spat upon and kicked and beaten and tortured too. I can't bear this!
Please people, we've got to do something to halt our government and end this madness.
This article was not researched very well.
There are already a handful of Uighurs from Gitmo living in Albania after the USA gave Albania some money.
Why won't more money buy these Uighurs a place in Albania or some place else?
Heck I will take them for $500,000.
Let me get this straight, one of the "terrorists" being detained in this high-security prison has been accused of a war crime for killing an American solider in a firefight in Afghanistan? Last time I checked, that was called war. If we didn't want our soldiers to be shot at, we should not have sent them there in the first place.
And then we have innocent people being held because there is no place to send them? This is pure insanity and is so highly illustrative of the lunacy of the Bush administration. Obama will be able to prove the change we can believe in if and when he deals with this mess.
Good comment tanguero. "Khadr, 22, is accused of war crimes, including the murder of a U.S. soldier during a firefight in Afghanistan in July 2002."
Can it be called "murder" or a "war crime" when one fights against armed soldiers invading your town? I hate this distortion of language.
Joe
It should be noted that Khadr was fifteen years old at the time of this "crime"
Perhaps he is being charged with it since the article states he is Canadian. A Canadian citizen resisting an invasion in Afghanistan? Was it his town that was being invaded? We need further info on him I think.
And while your looking for further info do not forget to realize that everyone who attacked Iraq is a war criminal because it clearly is an unprovoked War Against the Peace punishable by death.
Shame on you wanting to prosecute a fifeteen year old boy as a war criminal, who fought against a vicious invading military.
He was fighting in Afghanistan dude, not Iraq. And I don't want to prosecute him, I'm just wondering about the circumstances of how he came to be there and think that may be a factor in his charge. Try not to be too accusatory. And are Crimes against Peace punishable by death? I honestly do not know.
I did not say he was in Iraq, I was reference true war criminals. Iraq is a War Against the Peace,(one could make a case for Afghanistan since we are really there for the pipelines), which is an unprovoked attack on a sovereign nation. As many War Crimes it is punishable by death.
Well as the later posters say he was told by his father to be translator and he had no weapons training.
But really a fifteen year old boy? What convoluted rationale could make anyone battling an invader in a firefight a war criminal?
But the kid is dead now and many more will die because too many USAan's cannot grasp the magnitude of the horror that is their government.
Kahdr, who was 15 at the time of his "crime" of defending himself against an American attack, is not dead; it was Yemeni Muhammad Ahmad Abdallah Salih who committed suicide.
"Vicious invading military" applies to Afghanistan, too, and any Afghan or Iraqi who does NOT try to kill Americans is unpatriotic.
Were members of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, volunteers who fought against the Fascists in the Spanish Revolution, criminals because they were not Spanish? -- As in "Hey, he killed someone; it's just a coincidence that there's a war going on"?
Why should it matter that it's his town? It certainly is not an American town.
I don't mean to suggest that killing is less lethal during wartime or because it's done by one side instead of another. But the US position here is past indefensible:
The yanks invade. When they find it convenient, the resistance are "terrorists" instead of soldiers. When the bomb a town or mosque, the dead are "terrorists" and not people. When they capture someone, whether their own fellow citizen or a foreign national -- and accuse that individual, albeit informally, of terrorism -- the person neither receives treatment as a foreign combatant entitled to protection under the Geneva Convention nor as a criminal entitled to protection under the Bill of Rights.
No, this is generically the same kind of action as conducted by Savat, Pinochet, Stalin, or the Spanish Inquisition. The difference in modus operandi comes because the American population that works to support the terror has the idea that it does not. Anything that wises the American public up creates a significant drag on the war effort and reduces profits.
Further info's great, but there's no conceivable info that could come forward to justify holding people in secret without trial, let alone the more direct and obvious tortures, like drowning and concussions and breaking limbs. If the American population does not howl about these things, their government will keep drifting towards its totalitarian soulmates.
"Were members of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, volunteers who fought against the Fascists in the Spanish Revolution, criminals because they were not Spanish?"
I was thinking of that example too..and the Flying Tigers, other examples. I'm sure the succeeding Spanish government and Japan thought so at the time.
The thing is, way back then, we had nearly global support for invading Afghanistan. It was not seen as a war of aggression, but as a legitimate act of self-defense. It wasn't a Crime against Peace as the Iraq invasion was. Lately of course, that has changed.
And of course I agree that the detainee system used by the U.S. is horrible and criminal. Like I said, I'm just curious as to how a Canadian kid was caught up in a firefight in Afghanistan, and since the fact is he wasn't native to Afghanistan may have played a role in the murder charge. But the lack of evidential standards when it comes to our detainee systems means we will probably never know for sure.
The invasion of Afghanistan was NOT a legitimate act of self-defense. The 19 hijackers were NOT from Afghanistan, they were from Saudi Arabia (if you believe the official story). The Taliban offered to turn in Osama bin Laden, if he were guaranteed a fair trial. It was certainly a Crime against Peace--and not just lately.
There were plenty of innocent people, from a variety of countries "caught up" in the fighting in Afghanistan. John Walker Lindh (sp?), the "American Taliban" comes to mind. Many of them were literally sold to the invaders by bounty hunters. To think there is any legal basis for their incarceration and torture is beyond ludicrous.
The consensus of foreign governments at the time seemed to consider it self-defense, at least publicly. We may look at it differently, but our condemnations really mean little if none of our representatives care about it (and practically none do).
I certainly have to agree with you on this. The whole "War" on terror is as one-sided as the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Come to think of it, the US is supplying the overwhelming military firepower for that one, too.
I understand that there are Uighurs who are legally in the US who would gladly sponsor those 16 prisoners, but the government won't let them come here. Somehow, our government seems to think that people who have been determined to have never been anti-American Muslim militants before they were locked up, just might harbor resentment for the way they have been treated over the past 7 years.
Americans are so STUPID, especially the warmongering idiot who unconstitutionally occupied the White House for 8 years.
Well said Tanguero, although not so much a war as an invasion. And all the various conventions of war give people invaded the right to armed resistance against an invader.
Rainborowe
From the article:
"They have no regard for human life, neither ours nor their own," then-Guantanamo commander Rear Adm. Harry Harris Jr. said.
And so to prove how much we value human life, we'll kill every last one of them?
he full quote:
"They have no regard for human life, neither ours nor their own," then-Guantanamo commander Rear Adm. Harry Harris Jr. said. "I believe this was not an act of desperation but an act of asymmetric warfare against us."
So, even in these final desperate acts they are called "terrorists". This Harry Harris is like all military officers, is a self-brainwashed scum of scum.
To top it all, Harris is probably a pro-lifer.
And a hell fire and damnation preaching "Christian" who chronically complains about the values and morals of others (i.e. sinners.)
Just another chapter in the genocidal fairy tale called, "The American Empire". Started with massacres of men women and children back around 1609 in Manahatta (then we put their heads on pikes and had a party) and continues to this day raping little boys in front of their mothers, raping women to degrade them, and slicing the penis of helpless men just to hear them scream. Yes, this IS God's Country - except this god is a genocidal blood god of a desert tribe of pastoralist genocidal killer nomads from the ME - this 'deity' drinks human blood - called sacrifices to the WAR MACHINE...deus ex machina...cum feral Oligarchy - now that's ENTERTAINMENT in hell.
The horrors perpetrated on countless people by the insane American government and military just goes on and on!! When will this sunami of insane evil end? Torture, Murder, Genocide, Environmental Destruction and Theft, this is what the US represents to the world today. I have been watching this since the false flag event of 9/11 and have come to know what Carl Jung, the father of modern depth psychology, said about 'absolute'evil'...it is a shattering experience!
I can add nothing. Thank you guys. The U.S. is evil and has been for a long time, betraying its ideals.
Quite frankly, the more I hear the US Generals speak, the more idiotic they become. I am reminded of an exchange said to have occurred between Napoleon and one of his officers.
Napoleon; Everything this soldier says is absolutely ridiculous. Tell me what should we do about him?
Officer; Promote him to a General Mon Emperor, then everything he says will seem perfectly reasonable.
For the record Omar Khadr speaks Pashtun, Arabic and English his function was to translate for the mixed bag of fighters he was found with, he had not received any weapons training (he was 15 years old at the time), also he was compelled to do what he was doing because his father instructed him to participate.
That idiot Harris ought to be waterboarded until he starts telling the "truth".
Sophie Scholl-The Final Days
The twelfth major U.S. investigation into Guantanamo Bay
found that forcing an inmate to behave like a dog was not
inhumane. Abdul Rahim Muslim Dost, who returned to
Pakistan after three years in Guantanamo Bay, said that
writing poetry kept him sane while imprisoned. "They may
have weapons and missiles," he wrote, "but we can find no
sign of manhood in this army."
Harper's Weekly July 19,2005.
He's right.
Rainborowe
Suicide, when it occurs at the Guantanamo concentration camp, is not suicide, but an act of asymmetric warfare. "They" really think we are the biggest morons in the hemisphere.
"They" really think we are the biggest morons in the hemisphere."
"They" may be right. Afterall, this has been going on for eight long years, along with the destruction of our own domestic society, yet nothing changes nor has anyone lifted a finger to stop it.
Righto. We are all accomplices to this.
We are still in the same gene pool which gave us genocide of Native American Indian as we stole their land --
and enslavement of Africans in America followed by 100 years of Segregation, Inc.
THAT's the gene pool which has taken America backwards into
Crusades and torture.
When Royalty was overturned, elites moved on to capitalism/corporatism. And, Americans are pretty much waking up to capitalism now.
Welfare for the rich, free enterprise for the poor.
We need to re-regulate capitalism --
Un-regulated capitalism is merely organized crime.
We can live with an "economy" falsely constructed by
capitalists. We cannot live with capitalism.
Also keep in mind that this gene pool has warred on nature
since the beginning of patriarchy -- and needless to say polluted this continent in a brief 500 years.
"According to all myth, the female - not the male -- gives life"
You really need to review American demographics.
Written right after the three suicides.
---------------------------------------
Three Free at Last
There are hundreds bound for Heaven
For they’ve served their time in Hell,
In the BushCo run resort
That’s known to all as “Gitmo.”
Black cells, blinding lights,
Horrendous volumes of sound!
Rubber hoses, cold cells, fire and ice,
Deafening weeks of silence in solitary cells.
Seed of Afghan bounty hunters,
Picking up young men at random.
Forty pieces of silver per head;
No questions asked nor answers given.
Days spin out to weeks, to years.
Beatings, dogs, rape and fear
Waterboarding, tied and hung in agony.
Electric shocks, insults, threats it will get worse.
Ignorance is resistance, in the interrogator’s mind.
No law, no rights, no answer to their questions.
Eternal torture, you’re here for life,
Even if found not guilty.
Your Holy Books are spat upon,
Chewed by dogs and worse.
Your name has been exchanged
For a number and a curse.
Death is not worth many things,
But you’ll not find them here,
Doomed to spend your youth, your life,
Many years of abject fear.
To seek release, you decide
That you will eat and drink no more.
A few weeks or more of discomfort
And you’ll reach that far off shore.
But, “No!” your jailers say
They’re worried for your health.
They’ve always stopped the torture
When you could endure no more.
So they strap you to a feeding chair,
Through your nose they shove a tube.
Crusted with the blood and snot
Of those who’ve gone before
And down the tube they pour the gruel
Of forbidden food and offal,
And joke and laugh and pat your head
And grin at your tears of shame.
And so you renounce your time of fast
Even that is denied your soul.
And your captors rejoice at your years ahead
To be lived in durance vile.
But then you work with infinite stealth
And ropes from rags you twist
And in the dark of night
You fashion a saving noose
In silence you step off your bunk
And in minutes your soul flies free
Looking down at that tortured thing
That was so hard to leave.
And laughing at your torturers
When they look into your cage,
To find that there’s nothing left
To be a target for their rage.
Three have escaped and flown to Heaven
Inspiration for hundreds more.
Who seek an end to their living death
On Gitmo’s far off shore.
Steve Osborn
11 June 2006
---------------------------------------
And still it goes on. So sad.
Why doesn't the USA provide asylum to the innocent Uighurs whose lives it so disgustingly disrupted. It would b cheaper than keeping them as torture fodder for the sadistic social rejects in America who have no other outlet for their fetishes but to join the military.
The US reminds me of an old zombie or vampire movie where a formerly normal human being has died and his soulless animated body goes on a rampage of death and destruction.
My country's stormtroopers invade someone else's country, then put those who fought them on trial for killing the stormtroopers.
Sieg shite.
Have we tried to find a Muslim country that will take them? It seems a logical place to look for asylum. Perhaps Indonesia?
No country will take the Uighurs, especially the US, since that would upset China and the US is the last country that can afford to thumb their nose at China.
"A Guantanamo Bay detainee committed suicide late Monday..."
Former VP Cheney, any comment?
"So what? Go f@#k yourself. 911."
If I was a soldier, I'd be pretty damned upset at the increased risks I face abroad thanks to Cheney Outlaws Inc.
"He had been held without charges at Guantanamo since February 2002 and appeared to have joined a lengthy hunger strike, according to medical records released in response to an Associated Press lawsuit." ...think of that...What a nightmare...held without charges for 7 years...This is worse than I'd thought...shame on each and everyone of that stays silent...We should have stormed the Bush Bastille with picks and axes long ago...Obama cannot NOT look back...the world is watching this...they know what we've done...
How incredibly tragic. The only way these poor people can get out is by committing suicide. Obama is complicit and has blood on his hands.
a US soldier taking an Afgan's life is "killing" but an Afgan defending an invasion of his country, taking a US soldier's life is "murder"? just want to be politcally correct.
If we are really lucky, maybe all of the prisoners will commit suicide and that will take care of the problem. Send them cake laced with arsenic.
And it's these people who fight to retain the land and resources their families need to live who we're told "have no regard for human life."
Assuming that Curtis isn't being sarcastic, I conclude that he must be Admiral Harris' son.
His full name must be "Curtis LeMay Harris". That would explain it.
· Yr Obd't Servant
Wow! what a true A-hole this Admiral Harris is! They're commiting suicide after years of imprisonment, no trial, after torture - I can't enven believe people like this guy exist.
Most of the rest of the world exist with the boot of the United States on their throats. Like Nigeria, Much of South America, plenty of places. Their only weapons are meager, compard to our Weapons of Mass Destruction.
If you think Mr. Rear Admiral Harris, Jr., that this is warfare against the U. S. then you are a sick sick man.
I want to know how many of the detainees were innocent. I want to know if they killed as many people as Bush and Chaeney have with their stupid greedy policy of protecting American interests... I'm so mad tonight, I hope I'm not just spewing but that's what I feel like. I can't wait to see all those that have created the barbaric foreign policies we have been following for-how many decades? I can't wait to see these people run with their tails between their legs and licking their.... I'm just discusted with my own gov. I did have hope in Obama. I don't know what to think. The Israeli thing today, his comments on their need to stop the West Bank settlements was good. But I'm still holding my breath to see these torture criminals held accountble.
Long live the U.S. Constitution-it wwas a beginning... but we have helped to bring it down...
A true interest in the USA would involve phasing out fossilmfuels.
What has happened is that multinationals have superceded national boundries and any nation is expendable, as is the USA.
This is just Vulture Capitalism on the grand national level of gutting the USA of all it's assets.
Phasing out fossil fuels is necessary to remove one excuse for monsters to destroy people's lives in order to keep the US fueled, but it won't happen for at least a century. During that time, we need to figure out how to get fossil fuels without using monster's tactics. But even after fossil fuels are either phased out, or the quantity needed by the US is reduced so that it can easily fill its own needs from domestic pumping, the monsters will still be around--it's human nature--so the ultimate goal is to focus on monsters and prevent them from getting into decision-making positions, and throwing them out if they still manage to get there.