Shaker Aamer gives his first full interview

You can watch the full interview here. It is more than an hour long.

If you want a shorter version go here.

Morrocan detainee released from Gitmo still held by Morroco

It was not enough that Younous Chekkouri was wrongfully held at Guantanamo for 13 years... when he was finally released back to his homeland in Morroco he was imprisoned yet again- based on the allegation made by the US military while holding him. The U.S. in a rare apology admitted that the reason it held Chekkouri all of those years was a mistake- but that has not been enough to secure his freedom. Chekkouri has now been held in prison in Morocco for more than 3 months-- with no end insight.
Read more here.

Obama honors war criminal Dick Cheney

First he protected Cheney from prosecution and now Cheney has been honored with a marble bust in Congress--- and Biden and Obama participated in the accolades... Read more here.

The Periodic Review Board....

As I have mentioned in previous posts- the term "periodic" takes on new meaning when it comes to the review of the status of the forever detainees (those detainees who have not been cleared for release nor charged with a crime but are deemed too dangerous to be released). There have only been 15 such reviews since Obama announced the process three years ago. Periodically they get around to reviewing one of the 46 men on the forever list. Andy Worthington has a breakdown of that list-- way down towards the bottom of the list you will find my client Abdel Razak Ali (ISN 685). He is dangerous because he was staying in the same guesthouse as an individual that the military thought was an al-Qaeda leader--- abu Zubaydah. Later (only after waterboarding him more than 100 times)- they realized they were mistaken about Mr. Zubaydah. That little error that has not changed the fate of my client and so he waits for his chance at the periodic review.
Read the Andy Worthington post here.

Human Rights Watch calls for an investigation into my country's torture of detainees....

In its report released this week the summary starts with this:

" It is now well established that following the attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001, the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) operated a global, state-sanctioned program in which it abducted scores of people throughout the world, held them in secret detention—sometimes for years—or “rendered” them to various countries, and tortured or otherwise ill-treated them. While the program officially ended in 2009, the cover-up of these crimes appears to be ongoing.

Many detainees were held by the CIA in pitch-dark windowless cells, chained to walls, naked or diapered, for weeks or months at a time. The CIA forced them into painful stress positions that made it impossible for them to lie down or sleep for days, to the point where many hallucinated or begged to be killed to end their misery. It used “waterboarding” and similar techniques to cause near suffocation or drowning, crammed detainees naked into tiny boxes, and prevented them from bathing, using toilets, or cutting their hair or nails for months. “We looked like monsters,” one detainee said of his appearance while in CIA custody.

Much new information about detention and interrogation in the CIA program became public with the release in redacted form of the 499-page summary of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence report in December 2014 (“Senate Summary”). The Senate Summary reported that the CIA subjected at least five detainees to “rectal feeding,” described in one case as infusing the pureed contents of a lunch tray into the detainee’s rectum via a medical tube, done “without evidence of medical necessity.” The Senate Summary also found that during a waterboarding session, one detainee became “completely unresponsive, with bubbles rising through his open, full mouth.” The CIA forced some detainees to stand for days on end without sleep while they had broken bones in their legs and feet, even though CIA personnel knew this would cause them long-term physical injury. A CIA cable described one detainee as "clearly a broken man" and "on the verge of complete breakdown."

The US government has not adequately accounted for these abuses. It has an obligation under international law to prosecute torture where warranted and provide redress to victims, but it has done neither. No one with real responsibility for these crimes has been held accountable and the government has actively thwarted attempts on the part of victims to obtain redress and compensation in US courts.

Read the entire report here.

Hillary apparently sought closure of Gitmo too.....

This article discusses a letter that Hillary sent to Obama as she was leaving the state department.... asking that Obama make good on his promise to close the place. Read the rest here.

The Tea Project....

Watch the video and find out if the project will be coming to a location near you.

Slahi asks for a review by the military...Updated.

One of the many pathetic things that Obama has done- or in this case hasn't done- is provide the prompt reviews for the men who are not cleared for release. My client is one of those men- as is Slahi- the author of the Guantanamo Diary. Now his attorneys are taking the military's failure to conduct a review to the court. read more here.

Meanwhile the judge that heard Slahi's request to force the military to conduct his review was not happy with the military's foot dragging.... "WASHINGTON—A federal judge chided U.S. President Barack Obama on Tuesday for pledging to close the Guantanamo detention facility while allowing the process for clearing detainees to drag on for years with no resolution in sight.

A 2011 executive order required a special board to review each detainee’s case within a year, with the aim of releasing those who officials from defense, intelligence and law enforcement agencies concluded don’t pose “a significant threat to the security of the United States.”

To date only 19 detainees have been reviewed, while 107 remain at the prison.

The judge made his remarks during a hearing on Tuesday over a lawsuit filed by one detainee, Mohamedou Ould Slahi, seeking to force the government to schedule his review."

Of course the real question is whether the good judge will do a darned thing about this.... Don't hold your breath.

read more here.

Not everyone was on board with Shaker's release?

It seems some of the military were not on board with Shaker's release. specifically the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. Hmmmm. I wonder why he would not want Shaker released. Could it be he is afraid about what Shaker knows? Time will tell but it is good news that he was ignored... and now our republican "leaders" can conduct some year long studies on this issue.
Read more here.

Obama's latest comments....

He claims he will still close Gitmo- but no details yet. I guess he has not had enough time to work out those details (7 years.....)
Read more here.

Same old--- Same old

Obama has apparently decided to delay his plans for closing Guantanamo.
Read more here.

The current Guantanamo numbers....

From our records keep Brian Foster:

"The prison population now stands at 107: 48 are cleared, 49 are awaiting clearance, and 10 are in the military commission system (of those, 7 are in “active” “trial” proceedings while 3 have been “convicted”).

Of the 48 cleared, 39 (81%) are Yemenis and 9 are non-Yemenis.

Of the 49 awaiting clearance, 23 are Yemenis and 26 are non-Yemenis.

Of note: for the first time, Yemenis slated for conditional detention have been transferred out of the prison.  Our client Adil Busayss had been cleared by the Bush Administration and then placed in the conditional-detention category by the Obama Task Force.  And al Rahizi (ISN 45) had been placed in indefinite detention by the Task Force and then approved for transfer by the PRB with the “conditions normally associated with conditional detention.”  As a result, the conditional-detention category has dropped for the first time, and now stands at 31.

The PRB has now approved for transfer 15 of the 18 detainees for whom it has issued decisions.  Four detainees are officially in the PRB process and awaiting their first hearing or decision.  42 detainees are PRB-eligible but have not yet officially begun the process.  (For these purposes, a detainee is “officially in the PRB process” when he shows up on the PRB web page tracking individual detainees’ proceedings.)"

h/o to attorney Brian Foster for keeping up with these numbers...

Vive la France--- continued.

A message from Shaker Aaman.... to those who supported him over the years.

Via Andy Worthington: Shaker is beginning the healing process but sends this message.
Best of luck to you Shaker...

5 Yemeni Detainees transferred to the UAE

Announced this evening by the military:

The Department of Defense announced today the transfer of Ali Ahmad Muhammad al-Razihi, Khalid Abd-al-Jabbar Muhammad Uthman al-Qadasi, Adil Said al-Hajj Ubayd al-Busays, Sulayman Awad Bin Uqayl al-Nahdi, and Fahmi Salem Said al-Asani from the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay to the Government of the United Arab Emirates.

That leaves the final count of detainees at Guantanamo at 107.