Guantanamo Cell Is Better Than Freedom, Says Inmate Fighting Against Release

An inmate of Guantanamo Bay who spends 22 hours each day in an isolation cell is fighting for the right to stay in the notorious internment camp.

Ahmed Belbacha fears that he will be tortured or killed if the United States goes ahead with plans to return him to his native Algeria.

The Times has learnt that Mr Belbacha, who lived in Britain for three years, has filed an emergency motion at the US Court of Appeals in Washington DC asking for his transfer out of Guantanamo to be halted. He was cleared for release from Camp Delta in February and his lawyers believe that his return to Algerian custody is imminent.

Mr Belbacha says that if he returns to Algeria, he faces the threat of torture by security services and murder by Islamist terrorists.

Zachary Katznelson, senior counsel with the human rights lawyers Reprieve and Mr Belbacha’s lawyer, has asked the US courts to block any transfer. “Ahmed is being held in camp six, the harshest part of Guantanamo,” he said. “His cell is all steel, there are no windows, he is not allowed to communicate with other prisoners and he gets just two hours exercise each day in a metal cage.

“He says his cell in Guantanamo is like a grave and that although it sounds crazy he would rather stay in those conditions than go back to Algeria. The fact is that he is really, really scared about what might happen to him in Algeria.”

Mr Belbacha, 38, fled Algeria in 1999 at the height of the brutal civil war between the Armed Islamic Group (GIA) and the Algerian Government.

He was an accountant for a state-owned oil company, Sonatrach, when he was called for a second spell of military service. The call-up was followed by death threats to him and his family from the GIA, which killed thousands of state employees during the 1990s.

Mr Belbacha went first to France and then to Britain, where he applied for asylum. He was given exceptional leave to remain pending the outcome of his application.

He lived in Bournemouth, Dorset, and worked as a cleaner at the Highcliff Hotel, where he cleaned John Prescott’s room during the 1999 Labour Party conference. The former Deputy Prime Minister left him a thank-you note and a £30 tip.

Mr Belbacha claims that in July 2001 he was persuaded by friends to go to Pakistan to undertake religious study. While there he crossed the border into Afghanistan.

When the US-led invasion began in response to the September 11 attacks he crossed back into Pakistan. He claims that in December 2001 he was apprehended by villagers near Peshawar, in northwest Pakistan, and sold to the authorities for a bounty.

American agents took him to a prison camp near Kandahar where, Mr Belbacha says, he was repeatedly beaten. In March 2002 he was flown to what was then Camp X-Ray at the US naval base in Cuba.

A military tribunal alleged that he had associated with the Taleban in Afghanistan and ruled that his detention was justified. But in February this year the US deemed him fit for release.

Mr Katznelson said: “Even though the Americans say he poses no threat, Ahmed fears that he has the stamp of Guantanamo Bay on him and he will be treated by the authorities as a terrorist if he is returned to Algeria.

“It is a bizarre situation because the reason he left in the first place was because the Islamist terrorists were threatening to kill him.”

Reprieve has asked the British Government to accept Mr Belbacha’s return here, but ministers have repeatedly said that they will intervene only in the cases of Guantanamo detainees who are British citizens.

Mr Belbacha lost his British asylum claim in 2003 because he failed to turn up for the hearing. Mr Katznelson said: “Ahmed knows he could be stuck in Guantanamo for a long time. However, he could be released tomorrow if the British Government would allow him to come back here.”

Mr Belbacha’s appeal to stay was rejected by a district court last week after the judge ruled that she had no jurisdiction in the case, despite believing the strength of his claims. His lawyers are prepared to go to the Supreme Court to prevent his transfer.

95% Proportion of Guantanamo detainees who posed at least a “potential threat”

The Gitmo Cookbook has over 100 pages of recipes, cooking tips, and even quotes about or applicable to Gitmo and the war on terror from sources as varied as Osama bin Laden, John Adams, Thomas Paine, Winston Churchill, and Shirley MacLain. In many cases, related quotes have been paired for the original (US Navy) recipes and the home version, as in the recipe for Parsley Buttered Potatoes:

* “Saddam’s torture chambers reopened under new management: U.S. management” - Sen. Ted Kennedy

* “Those who are shouting for ‘heads to roll’ over [Abu Ghraib] seem to have overlooked the fact that someone’s head has rolled - that of another innocent American brutally murdered by terrorists. Why is it that there is more indignation over a photo of a prisoner with underwear on his head than over the video of a young American with no head at all?” - Sen. Zell Miller

The Gitmo Cookbook also contains quotes from the detainees and interesting facts, such as -

* “The food is good, the bedrooms are clean and the heath care is very good. There is a library full of Islamic books, science books, and literature. Sports, reading, and praying, all of these options are not mandatory for everyone, it is up to the person.”

* More than 10% of detainees possess college degrees or obtained higher education at western colleges. Among the detainees are medical doctors, airplane pilots, aviation specialists, engineers, divers, translators, and lawyers.

* Abdullah Mahsud [Massood] was a detainee who was released in 2004 after claiming to be forcibly conscripted by the Taliban military to be an office clerk and truck driver. During his stay at Gitmo, his medical treatment included receiving a prosthetic leg. After his release, press reports from the Washington Post and Fox News indicate that al Queda linked militants, ordered by Mahsud, kidnapped two Chinese engineers in Afghanistan.

Baked Tandouri Chicken Breast, Mustard-Dill Baked Fish, Lyonnaise Rice, and Fish Amandine are just a few of the recipes you’ll find in the Gitmo Cookbook. We’ve tested them, and they are inexpensive, easy to make, and delicious.

Guantanamo detainee fights transfer to native Algeria, citing torture fears
AP ^ | 7/27/07 | Michael Melia

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1873229/posts
Posted on 07/29/2007 7:51:36 AM CDT by Valin

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico – A lawyer for an Algerian army veteran held at Guantanamo Bay said Friday he faces persecution from both the Algerian government and Islamic extremists if he is returned to his homeland as planned. A U.S. federal judge in Washington rejected an emergency motion Friday to prevent Ahmed Bel Bacha’s repatriation, and one of his attorneys said they will appeal.

Advertisement Bel Bacha is among at least two dozen Guantanamo detainees who have expressed fear that they will face abuse if sent to their native countries, according to human rights groups who dismiss as worthless diplomatic assurances they will be treated humanely. “The U.S. should not be relying on regimes that have a history of human rights abuses,” Zachary Katznelson, an attorney for Bel Bacha, told The Associated Press in a telephone interview. “Once someone leaves Guantanamo, the U.S. has no control over them.”

Algeria’s security forces have been accused of torturing suspects, the U.S. State Department noted in its 2006 report on human rights practices, citing international and local rights groups. Stuffing a rag into a suspect’s mouth while forcing contaminated liquids into the stomach until the person vomited was the preferred method because it left no traces of assault, the report said.

A U.S. military spokesman said the United States requires pledges that countries receiving detainees from Guantanamo will treat them humanely.

“Detainees are not repatriated to countries where credible assurances of humane treatment cannot be guaranteed,” said Navy Cmdr. Jeffrey Gordon, a Pentagon spokesman. He declined to comment specifically on Bel Bacha’s case.

U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer said in denying Bel Bacha’s motion to prevent his repatriation that the court lacks jurisdiction to hear cases from Guantanamo detainees that do not involve challenges to their confinement.

The attorneys had filed the motion because they believe the U.S. will soon repatriate Bel Bacha and six other Algerians, Katznelson said.

Bel Bacha, 37, lived briefly in Britain where he worked as a waiter before his capture in Pakistan. Attorneys have lobbied the British government to accept him and other British residents held at Guantanamo, but it has refused because they lack British citizenship.

The Pentagon alleges Bel Bacha had weapons training in Afghanistan and met Osama bin Laden twice, but ultimately determined he does not pose a threat. A military review process found him eligible for transfer.

Katznelson said he fears the Algerian government would mistreat Bel Bacha because he has been “unjustly branded” as an international terrorist by his detention at Guantanamo.

Bel Bacha also fears he would be hunted by al-Qaeda’s North African affiliate because he worked for a government-owned oil company and had been called for another term of military service, Katznelson said.

Bel Bacha was taken to Guantanamo more than five years ago and is held in a solid-wall cell by himself for as many as 22 hours a day. His attorneys say he would rather stay at Guantanamo if Algeria is the only other option.

The United States holds about 360 men at Guantanamo on suspicion of terrorism or links to al-Qaeda or the Taliban. About 80 detainees have been declared eligible for release, and the U.S. says it is in discussions with their home countries and third party nations to accept them.

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