The Guantanamo files: Classified files provide new insights in prisoners

WASHINGTON-A treasure trove of more than 700 secret military documents offers new and detailed accounts of men who have made time in the prison of Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, as well as new insights into the evidence against 172 men up there still locked.

The US prison in Guantanamo Bay holds still 172 prisoners, most rated "high risk". This article is based on a huge treasure trove of secret government documents leaked last year for the anti-secrecy organization of WikiLeaks, and to the New York Times from a different source on condition of anonymity made available.Editors and journalists, who edited this article will choose you answer questions about the coverage of the material. Prayed a prisoner in the Guantanamo Bay prison outside his cell in 2007, in an area for the most compatible prisoners.

Military intelligence officials, in reviews of prisoners written from February 2002 until January 2009, its history evaluated and provided insights into the tensions between captors and prisoners. What started as a jury-rigged experiment after the terrorist attacks of 2001 now seems a permanent American institution, and the leaked files, show why setting of bare the patchwork and contradictory evidence, which would never have stand in many cases in criminal court or a military tribunal.

The documents record meticulously the prisoners ' Pocket litter "if it is collected: a Kabul bus ticket, fake passports and forged student ID, a receipt restaurant also a poem. You list the prisoners diseases - hepatitis, tuberculosis, gout and depression. You note their serial interrogations, enumerate - even after six or more years of relentless questioning - remaining "areas of potential use." Describe in mates' infractions - die-cutting waking, apart tear slippers, screaming about cell blocks. And the analysts try to strengthen, it years of the prisoners comments to a different data set the case for further detention.

The secret documents, the New York Times and several other news organizations, show that most of the remaining 172 prisoners as a "high risk" of posing a threat to the United States and their allies, if published without appropriate rehabilitation and oversight have rated. But they show that about a third of the 600 already transmitted also a greater number of prisoners who have - left Cuba on other countries - have been called "High risk" before they were released or handed over to the custody of other Governments.

The documents are largely silent - including sleep deprivation, of loops in stress positions and prolonged exposure to cold temperatures - about the use of harsh interrogation tactics at Guantánamo, moved the global condemnation. Several prisoners, but are as shown, make up false stories about subject to abuse.

The Government basic accusations against many detainees have long public and often from prisoners and their lawyers have been challenged. But the dossiers, prepared under the Bush administration a deeper look at the frightening, if flawed, intelligence, which has the Obama administration, also persuaded, that the prison can not easily be closed.

Prisoners who worried especially counterterrorism officials include some defendants, assassins vowed for Al Qaeda, activists for a cancelled suicide mission and prisoners to their interrogators that she would wreak revenge against America.

The military analysts files offer new information about the berüchtigsten their prisoners, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the planner of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. At some point to March 2002 he ordered a former Baltimore resident, don suicide bomb vest and perform a "martyrdom" attack on Pervez Musharraf, then Pakistan's President, according to the documents. But as the man, Majid only a test Khan, the Pakistani mosque that he had said that Mr Musharraf would visit the assignment proved for his "willingness to die for the cause."

The files show the method of forecast years in the case of a false identity collect intelligence in war zones, or simple accident led to the police buildings innocent men. In May 2003, for example, included Afghan national army of prisoner 1051, an Afghan named Sharbat, close to the scene of a roadside bomb explosion that display documents. He denied involvement, saying that he was a shepherd. Guantanamo de Briefers and analysts agreed, citing its consistent history, his knowledge of animals and his ignorance of "simple military and political concepts," Beware of depending on its assessment. A "enemy combatants" explains still a military tribunal to him anyway, and he was not sent home until 2006.

Obama administration officials condemned the publication of classified documents, obtained last year by the anti-secrecy group of WikiLeaks, however, to the times from a different source. The officials pointed out, that an administration task force set up in January 2009 came the information in the prisoners reviews and in some cases checked at different conclusions. So they said, can the documents of the times published not a current view of the Government of prisoners at Guantanamo is.

See the results in the files:

?Switching 20th hijacker: the best documented case an abusive interrogation methods at Guantanamo survey was the coercive, end of 2002 and early 2003, by Mohammed Qahtani. A Saudi believes man 11 attacks to have been an intended participant in the Sept., Mr Qahtani was sexually humiliated like a dog, and forced to urinate on themselves restricted. His file says, "Although publicly shared entries claim that prisoner was subject to harsh interrogation methods in the early stages of detention," his confessions "appear to be true and are confirmed in the reports from other sources." But claims that it allegedly found made of at least 16 other prisoners have - especially in April and May 2003 - are cited in their files without any reservation.

Charlie Savage reported from Washington, and William Glaberson and Andrew W. lessons from New York. Scott Shane contributed reporting from Washington, and Benjamin Weiser and Andrei Scheinkman from New York.

View the original article here

THE Guantanamo files: Assessment of prisoners at risk, often with faulty evidence

Relations between waking and prisoners in Guantanamo Bay range from cooperative too dangerous.

WASHINGTON said Mohammed Alam Shah, a 24-year-Afghan, as teenagers, a leg lost, said interrogators in the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, he was conscripted by the Taliban as a driver had before, were imprisoned in 2001. He had caught were he said as he tried, "his to save younger brother of the Taliban.",.

This article is based on a huge treasure trove of secret government documents leaked last year for the anti-secrecy organization of WikiLeaks, and to the New York Times from a different source on condition of anonymity made available.Editors and journalists, who edited this article will choose you answer questions about the coverage of the material.

Military analysts believed him. Mr Shah, which doctors was fitted with a prosthesis of prison, was "cooperative" and "made has 2003 assessment known not thoughts of violence or made threats to the United States or their allies, a sympathetic". Their conclusion: "prisoner represents not a future threat to the United States or U.S. interests."

So in 2004 Mr Shah was - sent back to Afghanistan where he promptly revealed Abdullah Mehsud, a militant Pakistan born, and began plotting mayhem. He admitted jihadist videos, organized a Taliban force against American forces, planned an attack on Pakistan's Minister of the Interior, the 31 people killed, the kidnapping of two Chinese engineers and finally exploded a bomb supervised suicide in 2007, such as the Pakistani army closed. His martyrdom was celebrated in an audio message by none other than Osama bin Laden.

The Guantanamo's analysts complete misinterpretation of Abdullah Mehsud was included hundreds of classified reviews submitted by prisoners in the prison in Cuba, obtained by the New York Times. The unredacted reviews give the fullest public image date from the prisoners in Guantanamo in the past nine years. They show that the United States has hundreds of men for years without trial arrested based on a difficult and remarkably subjective evaluation of who they were, what they had done in the past and what could they do in the future. 704 Evaluation documents use the word "may" 387 times, "unknown" 188 time and "misleading" 85 times.

With judge, the documents of judgments on the legal challenges of prisoners show that the analysts ignored sometimes serious flaws in the evidence - for example, that the information from other pinned their mental illness was made them unreliable. Witnesses who say they saw a prisoner at a camp run by Al Qaeda but omit the witnesses record of falsehood or misidentification quote some reviews. Other government documents showing that the later often abusive treatment or torture statements attributed to have been withdrawn include admissions of prisoners without confirmation.

A growing suspicion

Written between 2002 and 2009, the reviews reflect a growing suspicion of Guantanamo analysts. From the outset, the reports are only one or two pages and often sanguine in tone. Of 2008, are prisoners reviews after searing advertising of released Al-Qaeda prisoners and the reduction of the prison population to hard core, was decidedly more cautiously.

In each case an Abdullah Mehsud - someone incorrectly assessed a minimal threat - there are several cases in which prisoners were rated "high risk" have published and not involved in misconduct. Murat Kurnaz, a German resident of Turkish origin, would be in a review 2006 Member of the Al-Qaeda, in the most dangerous category were addressed: "high risk" and "likely that endanger the United States, their interests and their allies."

Yet American authorities, under pressure from Germany and Turkey, overruled the analysts and Mr Kurnaz home Germany three months later. He joined not the global Jihad, but instead was a prominent critic of the Guantanamo, to write a book and the countless media appearances, which condemned American prison.

Under the most revealing who is leaking documents a 17-page guide for analysts, obviously from military intelligence instructors, how to measure the risk of a prisoner prepared. It lists large clusters of prisoners give, including the so-called dirty 30, the bodyguards were Mr bin Laden, as well as the large group of accused Al Qaeda activists captured with Abu Zubaydah, a key terrorist facilitator, with two guest houses in FaisalabadPakistan, 2002. It nine mosques with Al-Qaeda are associated in Quebec, Milan, London, Yemen and Pakistan.

The guide shows the smallest details such as a potential litmus test for risk taken up as analysts. If a prisoner had a watch Casio F91W, it could be an indication he attended make bombs had given a Qaeda course, where such watches have been - even though this model is sold to this day all over the world. (As well as the review of the Yemeni prisoners suggests a dire use for his calculator: "calculators can be used calculations of indirect fire such as audible warning for artillery fire.")

Caught a prisoner, without travel documents? Mean it could be that he had trained, identification make it more difficult to discard, explains how the Guide. A prisoner who claimed to be a simple farmer or cook in the honey business, or looking for a woman? Stories cover the common Al Qaeda and Taliban were, the analysts said.

And a classic catch 22: "Refusal to cooperate," says in the manual, is a technique, Al Qaeda resistance.

The Guide obviously still the product of years of experience most trying bits proof of different reliability in a conclusion to make. In particular, it is called as a cautionary tale of the early misconception about Abdullah Mehsud, the Pakistani suicide bombers, had claimed he was forced to join the Taliban. He was "an example," in the manual says, "Of a prisoner, the successful military cover story as a means to his release from US custody advertised."

Scott Shane reported from Washington and Benjamin Weiser from New York. Reporting was contributed by Charlie Savage from Washington, and William Glaberson, Andrew W. teachings and Andrei Scheinkman from New York.

View the original article here

Judges decline to hear an appeal against Chinese prisoners

The prisoners from the largely Muslim Uighur region, Western China, were taken prisoner in Afghanistan or Pakistan after Sept. 11 attacks. You have chosen by the Government, not a threat to the United States, and Justice Breyer wrote that all parties agree, that their detention "without legitimate reason." The prisoners want to be returned to China, where they are terrorists and fear torture or execution.

The question in the case of judge Breyer wrote, is whether judge released prisoners here on the Government objection can order.

The Supreme Court agreed to decide this question, in 2009, but it last year after the Government the Court said he had resettlement offers of Palau, an island nation in the Pacific Ocean, and a second unidentified country dismissed the previous case.

Last year zurückzusendenden an unsigned decision the Supreme Court of the case to the lower courts for further proceedings in the light of these developments. "No court in this case in terms of the new facts has chosen," said the decision, "and we are opposed to the first".

The United States Court of appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which against the prisoners for the first time to firmly had, it did again. In a concurring opinion in this decision from the judge Breyer cited on Monday, wrote judge Judith W. Rogers, that the prisoners had not claimed, that she would be subject to the abuse she had accepted the resettlement, and as the Government the solution name considered.

Judge Breyer pointed out that the Government remained ready, in his words, and "continue to work, find other options for resettlement." to "speak" again to the question with the Government of Palau

In the light of all this, judge Breyer wrote, "I see no Government imposed obstacle for the petitioners timely release and appropriate resettlement." But he added, that the prisoners free, back to court "circumstances should materially change."

Judge Breyer statement joined Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor. Justice Elena Kagan was disqualified from the case because she had worked on it as Solicitor General.

Their absence a decision for the prisoners made unlikely the Court of Justice had agreed the case Kiyemba, v. Obama, no. 10-775, hear, and the more liberal judges can have taken into account in the vote not to hear.

No action Monday took up the judge Virginia's unusual request that your challenge of the recent health care law are heard by the Supreme Court, before a Court of appeal has to weigh a chance. The case is Virginia v. Sebelius, no. 10-1014.

View the original article here