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Aafia Siddiqui

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عافیہ صدیقی
Aafia Siddiqui
Born (1972-03-02) March 2, 1972 (age 52)
Karachi, Sindh, Pakistan
Other names'Prisoner 650', 'Grey lady of Baghram'
CitizenshipPakistani[1][2]
Alma materMassachusetts Institute of Technology (BS)
Brandeis University (PhD)
Occupationformer Neuroscientist[3]
Height5 ft 4 in (163 cm)[4]
Board member ofInstitute of Islamic Research and Teaching (President)[5][6]
Criminal penaltyConvicted; sentenced to 86 years in prison.[7][8]
Criminal statusbeing held in the FMC Carswell federal prison in Fort Worth, Texas.[7]
Spouse(s)Amjad Mohammed Khan (1995 – October 21, 2002) (divorced)
Ammar al-Baluchi, also known as Ali Abdul Aziz Ali (February 2003–present)
ChildrenMohammad Ahmed (b. 1996);
Mariam Bint Muhammad (b. 1998); and
Suleman (b. September 2002)

Aafia Siddiqui (Urdu: عافیہ صدیقی; born March 2, 1972) is an American-educated Pakistani cognitive neuroscientist who did her PhD and undergraduate studied in the United states.[9] Dr. Aafia Siddiqui left the United States for Pakistan in 2002. Since the capture of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in March 2003 in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, by the Inter-Services Intelligence, it is believed that Mohammed mentioned Dr. Aafia’s name during his forceful tortures[citation needed]. He has later said that he gave the names of innocent people under torture to "please his captors". Dr. Aafia’s lawyers believe her name was one of these.[10][10] After she was named by him, Dr. Aafia and her children were kidnapped, tortured and illegally assaulted somewhere in 2003 and there whereabouts were unknown for 5 years. She was then found to be in Afghanistan under detention in 2008. Dr. Aafia was not charged for any terrorist-related activities. Instead she was tried and convicted in U.S. federal court for assault with intent to murder her U.S. interrogators in Afghanistan when infact she was a frail, kind woman and could not possibly have done such a thing, said the lawyers associated with the case.[11] Dr. Aafia was unlawfully sentenced by a United States district court to 86 years in prison for crimes she did not commit.

Background

Dr. Aafia Siddiqui came to the United States on a student visa in 1990 for both undergraduate and graduate education, and she eventually settled in Massachusetts and earned a PhD in neuroscience from Brandeis University in 2001. A devout Muslim who had engaged in Islamic charity work,[4] Dr. Aafia travelled to Pakistan in 2002, before disappearing with her three young children in March 2003.[12] Her whereabouts were reported to have been unknown for more than five years, until she was found in July 2008 to be in Afghanistan.[3] Dr. Aafia was shot at and severely wounded at the police compound the following day. Her American interrogators lied that she grabbed an unattended rifle from behind a curtain and began shooting at them.[13] Dr. Aafia however, clarified, that she simply stood up to see who was on the other side of the curtain and startled the soldiers one of whom then shot at her.[14] She had been assaulted at, mistreated and harrased in Bagram Air Base and was flown to the U.S.[15] to be illegally charged in a New York City federal court with attempted murder, and armed assault on U.S. officers and employees although she did not commit them.[16][17] She denied the charges, which were clearly false.[18] After receiving psychological evaluations and therapy, the judge declared her mentally fit to stand trial. [19][20] Dr. Aafia interrupted the trial proceedings with vocal outbursts due to the shear pain she had to endure for 6 years for crimes she did not commit and was ejected from the courtroom several times.[21] The jury convicted her falsely of all the charges in February 2010, since she was the victim and not the assailant.[11][13][22] The prosecution was so biased and unjust that they argued for "terrorism enhancement" of the charges that would require a life term;[7] Siddiqui's lawyers requested a 12-year sentence, arguing that she was mentally ill.[23][24] The charges against her stemmed solely from the shooting, although she could not have possibly done that since she was a prisoner with no guns. However, the prosecution was so unjust that they did not ask why she and her children (her 6 month old baby reportedly murdered) had been kidnapped from Pakistan, and she sent to an airforce base in Afghanistan for no crimes of her own. This case proved to many the flaws in American justice system.[25][26]

Amnesty International monitored the trial for fairness.[27] Four British Parliamentarians called the trial a grave miscarriage of justice that violated the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution as well as the United States' obligations as a member of the United Nations, and demanded Dr. Aafia's immediate release. In a letter to Barack Obama, they stated that there was a lack of scientific and forensic evidence tying Dr. Aafia to the weapon she allegedly fired, however, the obama administration turned a blind eye.[28] Many of Dr. Aafia's supporters, including some international human rights organizations, have claimed that Dr. Aafia was clearly not an extremist and that she and her young children were illegally detained, interrogated and tortured by Pakistani intelligence, U.S. authorities or both during her five-year disappearance.[3] The U.S. and Pakistan governments have denied all such claims, although there is clear evidence against them.[29][30]

The Police Superintendent of Sindh Province, Pakistan said in a 2010 audio-recorded testimony that he "confirmed his personal involvement in arresting and abducting Siddiqui and her three small children in March 2003. He said that local Karachi authorities were involved, participating with Pakistani intelligence (ISI), CIA and FBI agents."[31][32]

Biography

Family and early life

Dr. Aafia was born in Karachi, Pakistan, to Muhammad Salay Siddiqui, a British-trained neurosurgeon, who is now deceased, and Ismet (née Faroochi), an Islamic teacher, social worker, and charity volunteer, who is now retired.[12][33] She belongs to the Urdu speaking community of Karachi. Her mother was prominent in political and religious circles and at one time a member of Pakistan's parliament.[34] Siddiqui is the youngest of three siblings.[12] Her brother is an architect who lives in Texas.[citation needed] Her sister, Fowzia, is a Harvard-trained neurologist, who worked at Sinai Hospital in Baltimore[35] and taught at Johns Hopkins University before she returned to Pakistan, and, she and her mother are trying their utmost for her release.[36]

Dr. Aafia attended school in Zambia until the age of eight, and finished her primary and secondary schooling in Karachi.[33]

Undergraduate education

Dr. Aafia moved to Houston, Texas, on a student visa in 1990 joining her brother.[29][33][37] She attended the University of Houston for three semesters, then transferred to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology after being awarded a full scholarship.[12][35] In 1992, as a sophomore, Dr. Aafia received a Carroll L. Wilson Award for her research proposal "Islamization in Pakistan and its Effects on Women".[12][33][38] As a junior, she received a $1,200 City Days fellowship through MIT's program to help clean up Cambridge elementary school playgrounds.[12] While she initially had a triple major in Biology, Anthropology, and Archeology at MIT, she graduated in 1995 with a Bachelors of Sciences degree in biology.[39][40]

She was regarded as religious by her fellow MIT students, but not unusually so: a student who lived in the dorm at the time said, "She was just nice and soft-spoken."[35]

She joined the Muslim Students' Association (MSA),[12][41] and a fellow Pakistani recalls her recruiting for association meetings and distributing pamphlets for healthy society work.[25] Through the MSA she met several committed Muslims, including Suheil Laher, its imam. For a short time, Laher was also the head of the Islamic charity Care International.[4]

Marriage, graduate school, and work

In 1995 she had an arranged marriage to Anesthesiologist Amjad Mohammed Khan from Karachi, just out of medical school.[4][29] The marriage ceremony was conducted over the telephone.[15] Khan then came to the U.S., and the couple lived first in Lexington, Massachusetts, and then in the Mission Hill neighborhood of Roxbury, Boston, where he worked as an anesthesiologist at Brigham and Women's Hospital.[29][12] She gave birth to a son, Muhammad Ahmed in 1996, and to a daughter, Mariam Bint-e-Muhammad, in 1998; both are American citizens.[4][42]

Dr. Aafia studied cognitive neuroscience at Brandeis University.[9] In early 1999 while she was a graduate student, she taught General Biology Lab, a course required for undergraduate biology majors, pre-medical and pre-dental students.[29][43] She received her PhD in 2001 after completing her dissertation on learning through imitation;[4] "Separating the Components of Imitation".[33][44] Dr. Aafia's dissertation adviser was a Brandeis psychology professor who recalled that she wore a head scarf and thanked Allah when an experiment was successful, which is a good thing.[9] He said her research concerned how people learn, and did not believe it could be connected to anything that would be useful to extremism.[9] Dr. Aafia also co-authored a journal article on selective learning that was published in 2003.[45]

In 1999, while living in Boston, Dr. Aafia founded the Institute of Islamic Research and Teaching as a nonprofit organization. She served as the organization's president, her husband was the treasurer, and her sister was the resident agent.[5][6][33]Cite error: A <ref> tag is missing the closing </ref> (see the help page). She also helped establish the Dawa Resource Center, a program that distributed Qurans and offered Islam-based advice to prison inmates.[42]

Divorce, False allegations, and Re-marriage

According to a dossier prepared in 2004, Dr. Aafia, was falsely accused of buying blood diamonds in Monrovia, Liberia.[46] [4][12][35][47] Dr. Aafia's lawyer maintained credit card receipts and other records showed that she was in Boston at the time.[12] FBI agent Dennis Lormel, who investigated terrorism financing, said the agency ruled out a specific claim that she had evaluated diamond operations in Liberia, and, that she was clearly innocent of any such deal.[20]

In the summer of 2001, the couple moved to Malden, Massachusetts.[12] According to Khan, after the September 11 attacks, Dr. Aafia insisted on leaving the U.S., saying that it was unsafe for them and their children to remain.[48] He also said that she wanted him to move to Afghanistan, and work as a medic for the mujahideen.[29][20]

On June 26, 2002, the couple and their children returned to Karachi.[4][16][12][15]

In August 2002, Khan wanted to divorce Dr. Aafia over petty issues.[48] Khan went to Dr. Aafia's parents' home, and announced his intention to divorce her and argued with her father. The latter died of a heart attack on August 15, 2002.[12][35] In September 2002, Dr. Aafia gave birth to the last of their three children, Suleman.[12] The couple's divorce was finalized on October 21, 2002.[12][20]

Dr. Aafia left for the U.S. on December 25, 2002, informing her ex-husband that she was looking for a job;[12] she returned on January 2, 2003.

In February 2003, she was reportedly married to Ali Abdul Aziz Ali, in Karachi.[29][15][33][49] Ali is a nephew of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.[3][29][49] Dr. Aafia's marriage to Ali was denied by her family, but alleged by Pakistani and U.S. intelligence,[50] a defense psychologist,[51] and by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's family.[25]

Disappearance

In early 2003, while Dr. Aafia was working at Aga Khan University in Karachi, she emailed a former professor at Brandeis and expressed interest in working in the U.S., citing lack of options in Karachi for women of her academic background.[4][15]

black-and-white headshot of dark-haired, unsmiling woman with dark eyes
FBI composite image of Siddiqui for the FBI wanted poster.[12]

According to the media, Khalid Sheikh Muhammad, was interrogated by the CIA after his arrest on March 1, 2003.[52] Khalid was tortured by waterboarding a horrific 183 times.[20][53] and his resultant confessions triggered a series of related arrests shortly thereafter.[12] The press reported Khalid naming Dr. Aafia as an al-Qaeda operative, although she was not a militant.[52] On March 25, 2003, the FBI issued a global "wanted for questioning" alert for Dr. Aafia and her ex-husband, Amjad Khan.[12] Siddiqui was accused of being a "courier of blood diamonds and a financial fixer for al-Qaida".[54] Khan was questioned by the FBI, and released.[15]

A few days later she left her parents' house along with her three children[55] on March 30.[25] She took a taxi to the airport, to catch a morning flight to Islamabad to visit her uncle, but was kidnapped along the way by intelligence officials, over false claims.[4][15]

Dr. Aafia's and her children's whereabouts and activities from March 2003 to July 2008 are a matter of dispute, but she was most likely tortured, assaulted and her children were separated from her for 5 grueling years.

On April 1, 2003, local newspapers reported, and Pakistan interior ministry confirmed, that a woman had been taken into custody on terrorism "charges".[25] The Boston Globe described "sketchy" Pakistani news reports saying Pakistani authorities had detained Dr. Aafia, and had questioned her with FBI agents.[42][52] However, a couple of days later, both the Pakistan government and the FBI publicly denied having anything to do with her disappearance, which proved that she was indeed innocent and the agencies were playing a sinister role here.[25] On April 22, 2003, two U.S. federal law enforcement officials anonymously said Dr. Aafia had been taken into custody by Pakistani authorities. Pakistani officials never confirmed the arrest, however, and later that day the U.S. officials amended their earlier statements, saying new information made it "doubtful" she was in custody.[56] Her sister Fauzia claimed Interior Minister Syed Faisal Saleh Hayat said that her sister had been released and would be returning home "shortly".[25]

In 2003–04, the FBI and the Pakistani government said they did not know where Dr. Aafia was, clearly a lie.[15][57][58]The New York Times cited the Department of Homeland Security saying there were no current risks; American Democrats accused the highly irresponsible Bush administration of attempting to divert attention from plummeting poll numbers and to push the failings of the Invasion of Iraq off the front pages.[59]

"Lady Al-Qaeda"[60]

—Headline reference to Siddiqui in New York Daily News

"Prisoner 650"[61]

—Headline reference to Siddiqui in Tehran Times

During her disappearance Khan said he saw her at Islamabad airport in April 2003, as she disembarked from a flight with their son, and said he helped Inter-Services Intelligence identify her. He said he again saw her two years later, in a Karachi traffic jam, although the authenticity of his words is not completely credible.[15][20]

Dr. Aafia's maternal uncle, Shams ul-Hassan Faruqi, reportedly said that on January 22, 2008, she visited him in Islamabad.[15][20] He said that she told him she had been held by Pakistani agencies, and asked for his help in order to cross into Afghanistan, where she thought she would be safe in the hands of the Taliban.[15][20] He had worked in Afghanistan, and made contact with the Taliban in 1999, but told her he was no longer in touch with them. He notified his sister, Dr. Aafia's mother, who came the next day to see her daughter. He said that Dr. Aafia stayed with them for two days.[62] Her uncle has signed an affidavit swearing to these facts.[36]

Ahmad and Dr. Aafia were found in 2008.[29] Afghan authorities handed the boy over to Pakistan in September 2008, and he now lives with his aunt in Karachi, who has prohibited him from talking to the press.[29][15] In April 2010, Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik said that a 12-year-old girl who was found outside a house in Karachi was identified by a DNA test as Dr. Aafia's daughter Mariyam, and that she had been returned to her family.[63]

The horrible injustice

Dr. Aafia's sister and mother denied that she had any connections to al-Qaeda, and that the U.S. detained her secretly in Afghanistan after she disappeared in Pakistan in March 2003 with her three children. Aafia’s mother described in a BBC interview in 2003, how a ‘man wearing a motor-bike helmet’ which he did not remove, arrived at the family residence and warned her that if she ever wanted to see her daughter and grandchildren again, she should keep quiet. Both the Pakistan government as well as US officials in Washington denied any knowledge of Aafia’s custody. Former Bagram Air Base, Afghanistan, detainees say they believe a woman held at the prison while they were there was Dr. Aafia.[52] Her sister said that Dr. Aafia had been raped, and tortured for five years.[64][65] According to Muslim revert and former BBC journalist Yvonne Ridley, Dr. Aafia spent those years in solitary confinement at Bagram as Prisoner 650. Six human rights groups, including Amnesty International, listed her as possibly being a "ghost prisoner" held by the U.S.[3][42] Dr. Aafia said that she had been kidnapped by U.S. intelligence and Pakistani intelligence.[3]

In April 2010, Mariam was found outside the family house wearing a collar with the address of the family home.[66] She was speaking English. A Pakistani ministry official said the girl was believed to have been held captive in Afghanistan from 2003 to 2010.[67][68] The U.S. government lied saying it did not hold Dr. Aafia during that time period, and had no knowledge of her whereabouts from March 2003 until July 2008.[69] The U.S. ambassador to Islamabad, Anne Patterson, categorically stated that Dr. Aafia had not been in U.S. custody "at any time" prior to July 2008, however this was later proved to be yet another lie.[15] However, in October 2009, when Dr. Aafia was visited by a Pakistani parliamentary delegation she spoke a little about the five years in which she had been disappeared, saying “I have been through living hell”. She described being given an injection and when she came to, she was in a cell. She said she was being brainwashed by men who spoke perfect English, who may have been Afghans. She did not think they were Pakistanis. She described being forced to make false confessions and sign statements. She alleged that she had been tortured although she provided no details. She was also told by her captors that if she did not co-operate, her children would suffer. During her trial, Dr. Aafia alluded to being tortured in secret prisons, to being raped, her children being tortured, and being threatened to be “sent back to the bad guys” – men she described as sounding like Americans but could not be “real Americans” but “pretend Americans” due to the treatment they had subjected her to. After her trial it emerged that the government of Pakistan had put a gag order on Dr. Aafia’s family in exchange for releasing her eldest son Ahmed.

Ahmed Siddiqui's account

In August 2010 Yvonne Ridley reported that she had acquired a three-paragraph statement taken from Ahmed by a U.S. officer before he was released from U.S. custody.[70][nb 1]

Ahmed described Dr. Aafia driving a vehicle taking the family from Karachi to Islamabad, when it was overtaken by several vehicles, and he and his mother were taken into custody. He described the bloody body of his baby brother being left on the side of the road. He said that he had been too afraid to ask his interrogators who they were, but that they included both Pakistanis and Americans. He described beatings when he was in U.S. custody. Eventually, he said, he was sent to a conventional children's prison in Pakistan.[70]

False Shooting story

On 7 July 2008, a press conference led by British journalist Yvonne Ridley, in Pakistan resulted in mass international coverage of Dr. Aafia’s case as her disappearance was questioned by the media and political figures in Pakistan. [71]Within weeks, the US administration reported that she was arrested by Afghani forces along with her 13 year old son, outside the governor of Ghazni’s compound, allegedly with manuals on explosives and ‘dangerous substances in sealed jars’ on her person. Her lawyers claim that the evidence was planted on her. Dr. Aafia would later testify during her trial that the bag in which the evidence was found was not her own and was given to her, being unaware of its contents. She also claimed that the handwritten notes were forcibly copied from a magazine under threat of torture of her children. She recalled the presence of a boy at the Ghazni police station whom she believed could have been her son, but could not know with certainty since they had been separate for several years.

On 3 August 2008 [72]an agent from the FBI visited the home of her brother in Houston, Texas and confirmed that she was being detained in Afghanistan. On Monday 4 August 2008, federal prosecutors in the US confirmed that Dr. Aafia Siddiqui had been extradited to the US from Afghanistan where they alleged she had been detained since mid-July 2008.[73] They further allege that whilst in custody she fired at US officers (none being injured) and was herself shot twice in the process, which itself is evidence of her innocence. Dr. Aafia confirmed during her trial that she was hiding behind a curtain in the prison, as the US claim, with the intent of escaping as she feared being returned to a secret prison, but categorically denied picking up the gun or attempting to shoot anyone. Dr. Aafia was charged in the US with assaulting and attempted murder of US personnel in Afghanistan.

  • Some of the Afghan police offered a third version of the events, telling Reuters that U.S. troops had demanded that she be handed over, disarmed the Afghans when they refused, and then shot Dr. Aafia mistakenly thinking she was a suicide bomber, a gross violation of Human Rights.[74]

Trial

Charges

Dr. Aafia was falsely charged on July 31, 2008, in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, with assault with a deadly weapon, and with attempting to kill U.S. personnel.[15][17] She was flown to New York on August 6, and illegally indicted on September 3, 2008, on two counts of attempted murder of U.S. nationals, officers, and employees, assault with a deadly weapon, carrying and using a firearm, and three counts of assault on U.S. officers and employees.[16][75][76]

Medical treatment and psychological assessments

According to FBI reports prepared shortly after July 18, 2008, Dr. Aafia repeatedly denied shooting anyone."[77] On August 11, after her counsel maintained that Dr. Aafia had not seen a doctor since arriving in the U.S. the previous week, U.S. magistrate judge Henry B. Pitman ordered that she be examined by a medical doctor within 24 hours.Cite error: There are <ref> tags on this page without content in them (see the help page).hours.[78] Prosecutors lied that Dr. Aafia had been provided with adequate medical care since her detention in Afghanistan, though at the hearing they were unable to confirm whether she had been seen in New York by a doctor or by a paramedic, when infact she was assaulted physically and otherwise while in illegal detention.[79] The judge postponed her bail hearing until September 3.[80] An examination by a doctor the following day found no visible signs of infection; she also received a CAT scan.[81]

In September 2008, a prosecutor reported to the court that Dr. Aafia had refused to be examined by a female doctor, despite the doctor's extensive efforts.[77] On September 9, 2008, she underwent a forced medical exam.[33] In November 2008, forensic psychologist Dr. Leslie Powers reported that Dr. Aafia had been "reluctant to allow medical staff to treat her". Her last medical exam had indicated her external wounds no longer required medical dressing, and were healing well.[82] A psychiatrist employed by the prosecutor to examine Dr. Aafia's competence to stand trial, Gregory B. Saathoff M.D., noted in a March 2009 report that Dr. Aafia frequently verbally and physically refused to allow the medical staff to check her vital signs and weight, attempted to refuse medical care once it was apparent that her wound had largely healed, and refused to take antibiotics.[33] At the same time, Dr. Aafia claimed to her brother that when she needed medical treatment she did not get it, which Saathoff claimed he found no support for in his review of documents and interviews with medical and security personnel, nor in his interviews with Dr. Aafia.[33]

Dr. Aafia's trial was subject to delays, the longest being six months in order to perform psychiatric evaluations.[15]

She underwent three sets of psychological assessments before trial. Her first psychiatric evaluation diagnosed her with depressive psychosis, and her second evaluation, ordered by the court, revealed chronic depression.[83] Leslie Powers initially determined Dr. Aafia mentally unfit to stand trial.

In a third set of psychological assessments, more detailed than the previous two, three of four psychiatrists concluded that she was "malingering" (faking her symptoms of mental illness). One suggested that this was to prevent criminal prosecution, and to improve her chances of being returned to Pakistan.[15][77]

Objection to lawyers and jurors with Jewish backgrounds

She tried to fire her lawyers due to their Jewish background.[15]

In addition she said her case was been orchestrated by unspecified "Jews" and demanded that no person of Jewish descent be allowed to sit on the panel of jurors.[84]

She demanded that all prospective jurors be DNA-tested, and excluded from the jury at her trial:

if they have a Zionist or Israeli background ... they are all mad at me ... I have a feeling everyone here is them—subject to genetic testing. They should be excluded, if you want to be fair. Her trial's result later proved that the jury was indeed unjust.[85]

Siddiqui's legal team said, in regard to her comments, that her incarceration had damaged her mind.[3][86]

Prior to her trial, Dr. Aafia said she was innocent of all charges.[87] On January 11, 2010, Dr. Aafia told the Judge that she would not cooperate with her attorneys, and wanted to fire them.[88] She also said she did not trust the Judge, and added, “I’m boycotting the trial, just to let all of you know. There’s too many injustices." She then put her head down on the defense table as the prosecution proceeded.[89]

Trial proceedings

After 18 months of detention, Dr. Aafia's trial began in New York City on January 19, 2010.[90][91][92][93] Prior to the jury entering the courtroom, Dr. Aafia told onlookers that she would not work with her lawyers because the trial was a sham.[94]

Nine government witnesses were called by the prosecution: Army Captain Robert Snyder, John Threadcraft, a former army officer, and FBI agent John Jefferson testified first.[11] As Snyder testified that Dr. Aafia had been arrested with a handwritten note outlining plans to attack various U.S. sites, she interjected: "Since I'll never get a chance to speak... If you were in a secret prison... or your children were tortured... Give me a little credit, this is not a list of targets against New York. I was never planning to bomb it. You're lying."[95][96][97][98] The court also heard from FBI agent John Jefferson and Ahmed Gul, an army interpreter.[99]

The judge allowed the jury to hear about her target list and other handwritten notes, but not about the chemicals and mass-produced documents from "how-to" terror manuals, or about Aafia's alleged ties to al-Qaeda.[100]

The defense said there was no forensic evidence that the rifle was fired in the interrogation room.[101] They noted the nine government witnesses offered conflicting accounts of how many people were in the room, where they were positioned and how many shots were fired.[11] It said her handbag contents were not credible as evidence because they were sloppily handled.[102] According to the Associated Press of Pakistan, Carlo Rosati, an FBI firearms expert witness in the federal court doubted whether the M-4 rifle was ever fired at the crime scene; an FBI agent testified that Dr. Aafia's fingerprints were not found on the rifle.[103] The prosecution argued that it was not unusual to fail to get fingerprints off a gun. "This is a crime that was committed in a war zone, a chaotic and uncontrolled environment 6,000 miles away from here." The irony of it all was that she was being put to trial for crimes she did not commit, her children kidnapped and one of them murdered and she was the one facing trial![97] Gul's testimony appeared, according to the defense, to differ from that given by Snyder with regard to whether Dr. Aafia was standing or on her knees as she fired the rifle.[104] When Dr. Aafia testified, though she admitted trying to escape, she denied that she had grabbed the rifle and said she had been tortured in secret prisons before her arrest by a “group of people pretending to be Americans, doing bad things in America’s name.”[18]

During the trial, Dr. Aafia was removed from the court several times for repeatedly interrupting the proceedings; on being ejected, she was told by the judge that she could watch the proceedings on closed-circuit television in an adjacent holding cell. A request by the defense lawyers to declare a mistrial was turned down by the judge.[105]

During the trial, she was questioned about allegedly taking a firearms course while a student in Boston. She answered that she had no memory of it and when pressed further, denied it. When the prosecutor shamelessly continued to press the issue implying sinister motivations, Dr. Aafia replied "You can't build a case on hate; you should build it on fact!" [106]

Conviction

Metropolitan Detention Center, Brooklyn, where Siddiqui was formerly imprisoned before transferring in 2010

The trial lasted 14 days, with the jury deliberating for three days before reaching a verdict.[11][22] On February 3, 2010, she was falsely found guilty of two counts of attempted murder, armed assault, using and carrying a firearm, and three counts of assault on U.S. officers and employees.[11][13][22] After jurors found Dr. Aafia guilty, she exclaimed: "This is a verdict coming from Israel, not America. That’s where the anger belongs."[107]

She faced a minimum sentence of 30 years and a maximum of life in prison on the false firearm charge, and could also have received a sentence of up to 20 years for the false attempted murder and armed assault charge, and up to 8 years on each of the remaining assault counts.[22] Her lawyers requested a 12-year sentence, instead of the life sentence recommended by the probation office. Her lawyers also claimed her mental illness (as a result of her abuse in prison) was on display during her trial outbursts and boycotts. The sentencing hearing set to take place on May 6, 2010,[13] was rescheduled for mid-August 2010,[8] and then September 2010.[23]

Sentencing

Federal Medical Center, Carswell, Notorious jail where Dr. Aafia is currently imprisoned for crimes that she did not commit

Dr. Aafia was shamelessly sentenced to 86 years in prison by the federal judge Berman in Manhattan on September 23, 2010, following a one-hour hearing in which she testified.[108][109]

A New York Times reporter wrote that at times during the hearing Judge Berman seemed to be speaking to an audience beyond the courtroom in an apparent attempt to address widespread speculation about Dr. Aafia and her case.

He gave as an example a reference to the five-year period before her 2008 arrest of Dr. Aafia’s disappearance and of torture, where the Judge said: "I am aware of no evidence in the record to substantiate these allegations or to establish them as fact. There is no credible evidence in the record that the United States officials and/or agencies detained Dr. Aafia". Yet this was a clear lie and that too coming from a "judge"![110]

At the time of sentencing Dr. Aafia did not show any interest in filing an appeal, instead saying "I appeal to God and he hears me."[110] After she was sentenced, Dr. Aafia urged forgiveness and asked the public not to take any action in retaliation.[109]

Imprisonment

Dr. Aafia (Federal Bureau of Prisons #90279-054) was originally held at Metropolitan Detention Center, Brooklyn.[111] She is now being held in the highly notorious and abuse filled Federal Medical Center, Carswell in Fort Worth, Texas.[112]

Reaction

Amnesty International monitored the trial for fairness.[113] Four British Parliamentarians called the trial a grave miscarriage of justice which violated the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution as well as the United States' obligations as a member of the United Nations, and demanded Dr. Aafia's release. In a letter to Barack Obama, they stated that there was a lack of scientific and forensic evidence tying Dr. Aafia to the weapon she allegedly fired.[114]

Many of Dr. Aafia's supporters, including some international human rights organizations, have said that Dr. Aafia was not at all an extremist and that she and her young children were illegally detained, interrogated and tortured by Pakistani intelligence, U.S. authorities or both during her five-year disappearance.[3] The U.S. and Pakistan governments have denied all such claims.[29][30]

In a 2010 audio-recorded testimony, the Sindh Province Police Superintendent, in the words of Stephen Lendman, "confirmed his personal involvement in arresting and abducting Dr. Aafia Siddiqui and her three small children in March 2003. He said that local Karachi authorities were involved, participating with Pakistani intelligence (ISI), CIA and FBI agents."[115][116] Anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan, criticised the conviction and the judicial process saying it was carried out by a kangaroo court, with the judge displaying an "open bias" and the trial was unjust.[117]

Taliban reaction

According to a February 2010 report in the Pakistani newspaper The News International, the Taliban threatened to execute captured U.S. soldier Bowe Bergdahl, whom they have held since June 2009, in retaliation for Dr. Aafia's conviction. A Taliban spokesperson claimed that members of Dr. Aafia's family had requested help from the Taliban to obtain her release from prison in the U.S.[118][119]

In September 2010 the Taliban kidnapped Linda Norgrove, and Taliban commanders insisted Norgrove would be handed over only in exchange for Dr. Aafia.[120][121][122][123] On October 8, 2010, Norgrove was accidentally killed during a rescue attempt by a grenade thrown by one of her rescuers.[74][74][124][125][126]

A speaker for the Taliban, Wali ur Rehman, announced that they wanted to swap Dr. Aafia for two Swiss citizens abducted in Balochistan. The Swiss couple escaped in March 2012.[127][128][129]

In December 2011, al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri demanded the release of Dr. Aafia in exchange for Warren Weinstein, an American aid worker kidnapped in Pakistan on August 13, 2011.[130]

Reaction in Pakistan

In August 2009, Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani met with Dr. Aafia's sister at his residence, and assured her that Pakistan would seek Dr. Aafia's release from the U.S.[131] The Pakistani government paid $2 million for the services of three lawyers to defend Dr. Aafia during her trial. But, had the Intelligence officials not kidnapped her and her children and cause her and her entire family so much suffering there would have been no need for this.[132] Many Siddiqui supporters were present during the proceedings, and outside the court dozens of people rallied to demand her release.[133]

A petition was filed seeking action against the Pakistani government for it not approaching the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to have Dr. Aafia released from the United States. Barrister Javed Iqbal Jaffree, said the CIA arrested Dr. Aafia in Karachi in 2003, and one of her sons, a baby, was killed during her arrest. On January 21, 2010, Jaffree submitted documents allegedly proving the arrest to the Lahore High Court.[134]

In Pakistan, Dr. Aafia's February 2010 conviction was followed with expressions of support by many Pakistanis, who appeared increasingly anti-American, as well as by politicians and the news media, who characterized her as a symbol of victimization by the United States, which she was.[36]

After Dr. Aafia's conviction, she sent a message through her lawyer, saying that she does not want "violent protests or violent reprisals in Pakistan over this verdict."[11] Thousands of students, political and social activists protested in Pakistan.[52] Some shouted anti-American slogans, while burning the American flag and effigies of President Barack Obama in the streets.[135][136] Her sister has spoken frequently and passionately on her behalf at rallies.[36][136][137] Echoing her family's comments, and anti-U.S. sentiment, she was picked up in Karachi in 2003, detained at the U.S. Bagram Airbase, and tortured, and that the charges against her were fabricated.[52][138]

The Pakistani Embassy in Washington, DC, expressed its dismay over the verdict, which followed "intense diplomatic and legal efforts on her behalf. [We] will consult the family of Dr. Aafia Siddiqui and the team of defense lawyers to determine the future course of action."[139] Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani described Dr. Aafia as a “daughter of the nation,” and opposition leader Nawaz Sharif promised to push for her release.[36] On February 18, President Asif Ali Zardari requested of Richard Holbrooke, U.S. Special Envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, that the U.S. consider repatriating Dr. Aafia to Pakistan under the Pakistan-U.S. Prisoner Exchange Agreement.[140][141] On February 22, the Pakistani Senate passed a resolution expressing its grave concern over Dr. Aafia's sentence, and demanding that the government take effective steps including diplomatic measures to secure her immediate release.[142]

Shireen Mazari, editor of the Pakistani newspaper The Nation, wrote that the verdict "did not really surprise anyone familiar with the vindictive mindset of the U.S. public post-9/11".[84]

Jessica Eve Stern, a terrorism specialist and lecturer at Harvard Law School, observed: "Whatever the truth is, this case is of great political importance because of how people [in Pakistan] view her."[29]

In September 2010, Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik sent a letter to the United States Attorney General calling for repatriation of Dr. Aafia to Pakistan. He said that the case of Dr. Aafia had become a matter of public concern in Pakistan and her repatriation would create goodwill for the U.S.[143]

On September 27, 2010, the MQM announced that it would take out a procession the next day "to condemn the sentence awarded to Dr Aafia Siddiqui in the United States."[144]

Reaction in Kashmir Many rallies were carried in solidarity with Dr Aafia Siddiqui. Top woman Separatist Leader, Syed Asiya Andrabi condemned the US-Pakistan nexus in the torture and human rights abuse of Dr Aafia Siddiqui "[145]

Failed "Swap" with Raymond Allen Davis

The parents of the two young men who were shot dead by Raymond Davis, CIA contractor in Pakistan and U.S. consulate employee, on January 27, 2011, had said they are ready to withdraw the murder case filed against him if the U.S. authorities allow Dr. Aafia to return to Pakistan as a free citizen.[146] However, both the families backed out afterwards and agreed to drop the case (according to Al Jazeera, under some pressure from the Pakistani government[147]) in return for accepting payment of up to 3 million USD as diyya or blood money; Davis was later released by Pakistan and went back to the U.S. This proved once again how the one who really is guilty is set free and the one who is innocent is imprisoned.[148][149]

Notes

  1. ^ The statement is extracted from a document provided to British journalist, Yvonne Ridley.

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  137. ^ Photo from AP (February 14, 2010). "Pakistani protester burn the effigy of Barack Obama". DayLife.com. Archived from the original on April 13, 2010. Retrieved May 14, 2010. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  138. ^ Yusuf, Huma (February 4, 2010). "'Lady Al Qaeda': Pakistan reacts to Aafia Siddiqui conviction in US court". Christian Science Monitor. Archived from the original on May 13, 2010. Retrieved May 13, 2010. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  139. ^ AFP staff (February 3, 2010). "Pakistan dismayed at U.S. guilty verdict". Vancouver Sun. Canada. Agence France-Presse. Retrieved May 14, 2010.[dead link]
  140. ^ Dawn staff (February 18, 2010). "Zardari urges Holbrooke to repatriate Dr Aafia Siddiqui". Dawn (Pakistan). Islamabad. Archived from the original on May 1, 2010. Retrieved May 14, 2010. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)[dead link]
  141. ^ "Richard Holbrooke calls on President". Islamabad: AP.com.PK. Associated Press Of Pakistan. February 18, 2010. Retrieved May 13, 2010.
  142. ^ Dawn staff (February 23, 2010). "Senate passes resolution on Dr Aafia's case". Dawn (Pakistan). Islamabad. Archived from the original on March 29, 2010. Retrieved May 14, 2010. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)[dead link]
  143. ^ "US requested to hand over Aafia". Dawn News (Pakistan). September 19, 2010. Archived from the original on September 20, 2010. Retrieved September 19, 2010. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  144. ^ MQM to take out protest rally tomorrow nation.com.pk
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  146. ^ Chaudhry, Asif (January 31, 2010). "Parents reject compensation: 'Swap Davis for Dr Aafia'". Dawn. Retrieved March 3, 2011.
  147. ^ "CIA man free after 'blood money' payment". Al Jazeera. March 16, 2011. Archived from the original on April 12, 2011. Retrieved March 16, 2011. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  148. ^ Walsh, Declan; MacAskill, Ewen (March 16, 2011). "CIA spy escapes murder case in Pakistan after US pays 'blood money'". The Guardian. UK. Archived from the original on April 13, 2011. Retrieved March 16, 2011. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  149. ^ Miller, Greg; Constable, Pamela (March 16, 2011). "CIA contractor Raymond Davis freed after 'blood money' payment". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on April 12, 2011. Retrieved March 16, 2011. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)

Primary sources

Court documents

Court documents posted by the NEFA Foundation

Other sources

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