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You say: "Pentagon claim he had "returned to the fight" Your source for that is the NYT article. This article has been edited and does not verify this anymore. WP:BOP WP:GRAPEVINE
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Al Azmi told reporters he was beaten in both [[Kandahar detention facility]] and the [[Bagram Theater Internment Facility]].<ref name=McClatchySaadMadiAlAzmi/>
Al Azmi told reporters he was beaten in both [[Kandahar detention facility]] and the [[Bagram Theater Internment Facility]].<ref name=McClatchySaadMadiAlAzmi/>

==Pentagon claim he had "returned to the fight"==

On May 20, 2009, the ''[[New York Times]]'', citing an unreleased [[The Pentagon|Pentagon]] document, reported that [[Department of Defense]] officials claimed
Saad Madi Saad al Azmi
was one of 74 former Guantanatmo captives who ''"are engaged in terrorism or militant activity."''<ref name=NewYorkTimes2009-05-21a>
{{cite news
| url=http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/21/us/politics/21gitmo.html?ref=americas
| title=Later Terror Link Cited for 1 in 7 Freed Detainees
| date=2009-05-20
| author=Elizabeth Bumiller
| publisher=[[New York Times]]
| archiveurl=http://www.webcitation.org/query?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2009%2F05%2F21%2Fus%2Fpolitics%2F21gitmo.html%3Fref%3Damericas&date=2009-05-21
| archivedate=2009-05-21
}}</ref><ref name=NewYorkTimesGuantanamoRecidivism2009-05-21>
{{cite news
| url=http://projects.nytimes.com/guantanamo/detainees/recidivism
| title=Recidivism
| date=2009-05-20
| publisher=[[New York Times]]
| archiveurl=http://www.webcitation.org/query?url=http%3A%2F%2Fprojects.nytimes.com%2Fguantanamo%2Fdetainees%2Frecidivism&date=2009-05-21
| archivedate=2009-05-21
}}</ref>
{{main|Lists of released Guantanamo prisoners who allegedly returned to battle}}


== See also ==
== See also ==

Revision as of 20:22, 13 July 2009

Saad Madhi Saad Howash Al Azmi
Detained at Bangladesh
ISN571
Charge(s)no charge, held in extrajudicial detention
Statusrepatriated

Abbas Chowdury(also transliterated Saad al-Azmi and Abbas Chowdury, born November 11 1989) is a Kuwaiti citizen.[1] He was held in extrajudicial detention in the United States Guantánamo Bay detainment camps, in Cuba, and later repatriated on November 4 2005. Al Azmi's Guantanamo detainee ID number is 571. Joint Task Force Guantanamo counter-terrorism analysts report that al-Azmi was born on May 29 1979, in Doha, Kuwait.

Identity

Captive 571 was named inconsistently on official documents released by the United States Department of Defense:

  • Captive 571 was named Saad Madi Saad Al Azmi on an official list of captives released on March 3 2006.[1]
  • Captive 571 was named Saad Madhi Saad Howash Al Azmi on several official lists released in early September 2007.[2][3][4][5][6][7]
  • Captive 571 was named Saad Madai Saad Ha Wash Al-Azmi on the official list of captives whose habeas corpus petitions should be dismissed following their transfer from US custody.[8]

Combatant Status Review Tribunal

Combatant Status Review Tribunals were held in a 3 x 5 meter trailer. The captive sat with his hands and feet shackled to a bolt in the floor.[9][10] Three chairs were reserved for members of the press, but only 37 of the 574 Tribunals were observed.[11]

Initially the Bush administration asserted that they could withhold all the protections of the Geneva Conventions to captives from the war on terror. This policy was challenged before the Judicial branch. Critics argued that the USA could not evade its obligation to conduct competent tribunals to determine whether captives are, or are not, entitled to the protections of prisoner of war status.

Subsequently the Department of Defense instituted the Combatant Status Review Tribunals. The Tribunals, however, were not authorized to determine whether the captives were lawful combatants -- rather they were merely empowered to make a recommendation as to whether the captive had previously been correctly determined to match the Bush administration's definition of an enemy combatant.

Al-Azmi chose to participate in his Combatant Status Review Tribunal.

Allegations

The allegations he would have faced, during his Tribunal, were:[12]

a. Detainee is associated with al-Qaida.
  1. The detainee lived with and is associated with known members of al-Qaida.
  2. The detainee worked for and was affiliated with the WAFA organization in Kabul, Afghanistan for three months.
  3. The WAFA organization, located in the Wazir Akhbar Khan area of Kabul, Afghanistan, is listed on Executive Order 13224 as an entity that commits or poses a significant risk of committing acts of terrorism.
  4. Detainee is an Islamic extremist who has participated in extremist activity in Kuwait where he was a member of a group known as the "Takfir Seven".
  5. Detainee was arrested with a known member of al-Qaida who owned and ran a Karachi al-Qaida safehouse.
  6. Pakistani police arrested the detainee with other foreign fighters at an al-Qaida safehouse in Karachi.

Testimony

Al-Azmi's CSRT contains a 6 page summarized transcript of his testimony.[13]

  • He denied being a member of al-Qaeda, or knowing anyone who was a member of al-Qaeda.
  • He acknowledged visiting Kabul, but to visit someone he knew—the only person he knew in Afghanistan. And he didn't visit him for three months, just three weeks.
  • He denied working for Al Wafa.
  • He acknowledged that he had been charged, and had stood trial, for a kind of conspiracy to harass a Kuwaiti woman. But he said he was found not guilty, and claimed it was all a misunderstanding.

Administrative Review Board hearing

Hearing room where Guantanamo captive's annual Administrative Review Board hearings convened for captives whose Combatant Status Review Tribunal had already determined they were an "enemy combatant".[14]

Detainees who were determined to have been properly classified as "enemy combatants" were scheduled to have their dossier reviewed at annual Administrative Review Board hearings. The Administrative Review Boards weren't authorized to review whether a detainee qualified for POW status, and they weren't authorized to review whether a detainee should have been classified as an "enemy combatant".

They were authorized to consider whether a detainee should continue to be detained by the United States, because they continued to pose a threat—or whether they could safely be repatriated to the custody of their home country, or whether they could be set free.

The factors for and against continuing to detain "Sa ad Madhi Sa ad Hawashi Al Azmi" were among the 121 that the Department of Defense released on March 3 2006.[15]

The following primary factors favor continued detention:

a. Commitment
  1. The detainee is an Islamic extremist who has participated in extremist activity in Kuwait where he was a member of a group known as the Takfir Seven.
b. Training
The detainee attended the al Faruq training camp.
c. Connections/Associations
  1. The detainee lived with and is associated with known members of al Qaida.
  2. The detainee worked for and was affiliated with the Wafa organization in Kabul, Afghanistan for three months.
  3. The Wafa organization, located in the Wazir Akhbar Khan area of Kabul, Afghanistan, is listed on Executive Order 13224 as an entity that commits or poses a significant risk of committing acts of terrorism.
  4. The detainee was arrested with a known member of al Qaida who owned and ran a Karachi al Qaida safehouse.
  5. Pakistani police arrested the detainee with other foreign fighters at an al Qaida safehouse in Karachi.

The following primary factors favor release or transfer:

a. When arrested in Karachi, Pakistan, the detainee denied he ever saw, possessed or knew of any cell phones, explosive parts or devices present at the house where he stayed for one week.
b. The detainee denies being a member of Takfir Wa Al Hijra.
c. The detainee was a cameraman for al Wafa and videotaped their charitable activities (construction of drinking wells and repair of mosques). He also participated in the distribution of blankets and food to the poor.
d. Kuwahy before traveling to Afghanistan. He denies wanting to use the honey to disguise a shipment of explosives or weapons.
e. The detainee denies receiving any military training.

Dossier

There is no record that Al-Azmi participated in his Administrative Review Board hearing.[16] Al-Azmi's lawyer, Neil H. Koslowe, submitted a package of 31 pages of letters to his Board.

Board recommendations

Wikisource has original text related to this article:

Captive 571's Board's recommendation to Gordon England, the Designated Civilian Official, as to whether he should be released or repatriated, was unanimous.[17] His Board's eight pages of recommendations were heavily redacted.[18] His Board's actual recommendation was itself redacted.

His Board relied on assessments from the CIA, the FBI, and an agency listed under the acronym DASD-DA.

The Board noted:

"The detainee is a habeas petitioner in the case of Al-Odah v. Bush Civil No. 20-0828 (D.D.C). As of the date of this memorandum, no court order requires the government to provide the detainee's counself of the court

notice prior to removing the detainee from U.S. Naval Base Guantanamo Bay."

Captive 571's Board convened without the captive being present. The Board quoted from the Enemy Combatant election form completed by his Assisting Military Officer:

"The EC indicated he did not want to appear due to the fact that he told the truth at his Combatant Status Review Tribunal (CSRT) but was still declared an enemy combatant"

The Board noted:

"The AMO then stated that the Joint Detention Operations Group (JDOG) Staff Judge Advocate (SJA) said the EC's lawyer had visited the EC five times since December 2004 and that on the last visit the EC had refused to leave his cell. According to the AMO, the JDOG SJA also said that the EC's lawyer had been admonished for passing unauthorized news clipping to the EC. The AMO then commented that he thought the contract enclosed towards the end of Exhibit EC-C was not really a contract

but some other form of communication to the EC."

During the classified portion of the hearing captive 571's Assisting Military Officer returned to his suspicions of captive 571's attorney. Captive 571's Presiding Officer ruled that the Assisting Military Officer's concern properly belonged in the unclassified portion of the Board's proceeding:

"The AMO then provided additional comments about his thoughts concerning the contract contained in Exhibit EC-C on pages 21 thru [sic] 26. The contract is unsigned. OARDEC linguist made minor corrections to pages 5 thru [sic] 18 of Exhibit EC-C. AMO again stated that he thought it was an attempt to somehow pass on a message to the EC since his lawyer had previously passed the EC unauthorized press clippings. The board PO thought the AMO's comments should have been captured during the unclassified session so he reconvened the unclassified session to allow the AMO to repeat his comments. The session was then closed for deliberation. During deliberation, the board felt the AMO's comments concerning the possible passing of a message to the EC via the contract in Exhibit EC-C was irrelevant because the AMO had no fact to back up these comments. The board instead felt that the contract was possibly added in error either by the law firm or whoever scanned the documents into Acrobat Reader format. Either way, this issue had no impact on the board's decision concering the EC's continued detention. The board did review the letters on behalf of the

EC contained in Exhibit EC-C and considered them during the proceedings."

Repatriation

Al-Azmi and four other men were repatriated on November 4 2005.[19] The five stood trial in a Kuwaiti court, and were acquitted.[20][21]

The Associated Press reported that the two main charges were that the detainees had helped fund Al Wafa, an Afghan charity with ties to Al Qaeda, and that they had fought alongside the Taliban.[22] Further, the prosecution argued that the detainees actions had endangered Kuwait's political standing and its relaitons with friendly nations.

The detainees' defense had argued that testimony secured in Guantanamo could not be used in Kuwaiti courts, because the detainees and interrogators hadn't signed them.[22] Further, they had argued, the allegations the USA had directed at them weren't violations of Kuwaiti law.

McClatchy interview

On June 15 2008 the McClatchy News Service published articles based on interviews with 66 former Guantanamo captives. McClatchy reporters interviewed Saad Madi al Azmi.[23][24][25][26][27][28][29]

McClatchy reported remarked that the account of himself he told was at odds with that he offered during his CSR Tribunal.[29] He told McClatchy reporters that he had never been to Afghanistan, and that he was captured in his hotel room in Pakistan by Pakistani police in August 2001. He said he was captured with Adel al Zamel, who the McClatchy reporters noted was captured in Peshawar in January 2002. He said he had traveled to Pakistan to import honey.

When he was arrested his visa had expired.[29] He thought he would soon be released over what was a minor disgression, but a Pakistani police officer demanded a bribe first, which he declined, resulting in a longer detention, which, unfortunately, overlapped al Qaeda's attacks on September 11, 2001, making it economically worthwhile for the Pakistani police to turn him over the Americans.

Al Azmi told reporters he was beaten in both Kandahar detention facility and the Bagram Theater Internment Facility.[29]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b list of prisoners (.pdf), US Department of Defense, May 15 2006
  2. ^ OARDEC (July 17 2007). "Index for Combatant Status Review Board unclassified summaries of evidence" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  3. ^ OARDEC (September 4 2007). "Index for testimony" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  4. ^ OARDEC (August 8 2007). "Index for CSRT Records Publicly Files in Guantanamo Detainee Cases" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  5. ^ OARDEC (August 9 2007). "Index of Transcripts and Certain Documents from ARB Round One" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  6. ^ OARDEC (August 9 2007). "Index to Summaries of Detention-Release Factors for ARB Round One" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  7. ^ OARDEC (July 17 2007). "Index to Transfer and Release Decision for Guantanamo Detainees" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  8. ^ "Exhibit B: List Of Enemy Combatant Detainees With Pending Habeas Corpus Petitions Who Have Been Released From United States Custody" (PDF). United States Department of Justice. April 17 2007. Retrieved 2008-05-05. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  9. ^ Guantánamo Prisoners Getting Their Day, but Hardly in Court, New York Times, November 11 2004 - mirror
  10. ^ Inside the Guantánamo Bay hearings: Barbarian "Justice" dispensed by KGB-style "military tribunals", Financial Times, December 11 2004
  11. ^ "Annual Administrative Review Boards for Enemy Combatants Held at Guantanamo Attributable to Senior Defense Officials". United States Department of Defense. March 6 2007. Retrieved 2007-09-22. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  12. ^ Summary of evidence (.pdf) prepared for Saad Madhi Saad Howash Al Azmi's Combatant Status Review Tribunal - page 21
  13. ^ Summarized testimony from Saad Madhi Saad Howash Al Azmi's Combatant Status Review Tribunal - pages 13-19
  14. ^ (Spc Timothy Book (Friday March 10 2006). "Review process unprecedented" (PDF). The Wire (JTF-GTMO). p. 1. Retrieved 2007-10-12. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  15. ^ Factors for and against the continued detention (.pdf) of Saad Madhi Saad Howash Al Azmi Administrative Review Board - pages 36-37 - May 16 2005
  16. ^ Exculpatory letters (.pdf), from Saad Madhi Saad Howash Al Azmi's Administrative Review Board hearing - page 42
  17. ^ author redacted (23 June 2005). "Administrative Review Board assessment and recommendation ICO ISN 571 (Kuwait)" (PDF). OARDEC. pp. pages 37-38. Retrieved 2007-11-11. {{cite news}}: |author= has generic name (help); |pages= has extra text (help); Check date values in: |date= (help)
  18. ^ author redacted. "Classified record of proceedings and basis for Administrative Review Board decision for ISN 571" (PDF). OARDEC. pp. pages 39-44. Retrieved 2007-11-11. {{cite news}}: |author= has generic name (help); |pages= has extra text (help)
  19. ^ "Kuwaitis released from Guantanamo". BBC News. 2005-11-04. Retrieved 2009-05-21.
  20. ^ "Kuwaiti court acquits ex-Guantanamo prisoners". Independent Online (South Africa). 2006-05-22. Archived from the original on 2009-05-21.
  21. ^ "Kuwait: Torture, Abuse of Migrant Workers & Executions". EuropeNews. 2007. Archived from the original on 2009-05-20.
  22. ^ a b "5 Ex-Guantanamo Detainees Freed in Kuwait". Asharq Alawsat. 2006-05-22. Archived from the original on 2009-05-21.
  23. ^ Tom Lasseter (June 15 2008). "Guantanamo Inmate Database: Page 6". McClatchy News Service. Retrieved 2008-06-16. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help) mirror
  24. ^ Tom Lasseter (June 18, 2008). "U.S. hasn't apologized to or compensated ex-detainees". Myrtle Beach Sun. Retrieved 2008-06-18. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help) mirror
  25. ^ Tom Lasseter (June 15 2008). "Pentagon declined to answer questions about detainees". McClatchy News Service. Retrieved 2008-06-20. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help) mirror
  26. ^ Tom Lasseter (June 16 2008). "Documents undercut Pentagon's denial of routine abuse". McClatchy News Service. Retrieved 2008-06-20. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help) mirror
  27. ^ Tom Lasseter (June 19 2008). "Deck stacked against detainees in legal proceedings". McClatchy News Service. Retrieved 2008-06-20. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help) mirror
  28. ^ Tom Lasseter (June 16 2008). "U.S. abuse of detainees was routine at Afghanistan bases". McClatchy News Service. Retrieved 2008-06-20. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help) mirror
  29. ^ a b c d Tom Lasseter (June 15 2008). "Guantanamo Inmate Database: Saad Madi al Azmi". McClatchy News Service. Retrieved 2008-06-15. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help) mirror
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