Moazzam Begg Tortured in Guantanamo posted by Richard Seymour

12 July 2004

US Forces Administration
JTF/JDCG, Guantanamo Bay, Cuba

To Whom It May Concern

Re: Supplementary Exposition (of statement elected 5 July 2004)

I, Moazzam Begg, citizen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain, attributed the number 00558 (Camp Echo), have felt it necessary to augment and further clarify the above noted statement and to accentuate my grievances and intentions.

After over two and a half years in the custody of the US military without charge, and by extension, without jurisdiction, I have yet to be afforded basic rights normally granted under the constitution of the USA and international law. I therefore demand, unconditionally and irrevocably, that I be released immediately and returned to my family and domicile in the UK, together with all possessions, including all items and monies confiscated by US/Pakistani “agents” from my residence in Pakistan on 31 January 2002.

In the likely event that these demands are outrightly rejected, or unnecessarily procrastinated, I demand the following rights under US law:

1. A thorough and peremptory explanation of all statutory rights available within US legislature, particularly with respect to foreign nationals.

2. Any and all charges/allegations be presented unambiguously and written.

3. Full access to international phone calls in order to communicate with family and lawyers.

4. Full access to legal representatives of my own choice and appointment.

5. A fully inventoried list detailing all property seized (as mentioned above).

6. Regular and timely access to postal communication with family and a halt to the obscuring and withholding of mail from home.

In addition to the aforementioned rights, I make it known that I expect logical and reasonable answers for the following violations and abuses, and intend to seek justice and accountability:

(i) The exact purpose for my abduction, kidnapping and false imprisonment on 31 January 2002, under the auspices of US intelligence and law enforcement.

(ii) Subsequently, what legal jurisdiction they had for taking me forcibly to Afghanistan.

(iii) By what legal authority was property and money confiscated, leaving my wife and young children destitute and penniless in their wake.

(iv) Why I was brought into a designated war zone and my life put at risk.

(v) Why I was physically abused and degradingly stripped by force, then paraded in front of several cameras toted by US personnel.

(vi) The reason for being held in Bagram detention facility for over a year and consequently being denied natural light and fresh food for the duration.

(vii) The exact purpose for my incarceration in solitary confinement since 8 February 2003.

(viii) Why all news pertaining to my situation has been barred from me.

(ix) The justification for withholding most of my family mail, and incongruent obscurance of what little amounts have trickled through - even from eight year olds.

(x) Why phone calls and legal representation have been continually denied, despite several reassurances to the contrary.

(xi) Why, despite copious requests, I have yet to meet with a chaplain during all this time.

(xii) What was the legality and purpose of extracting my signature on a statement, in early February 2003, by FBI and CITF agents, under threats of long term imprisonment, summary trials and execution - all without legal represenation.

I state here, unequivocally and for the record, that any documents presented to me by US law enforcement agents were signed and initialled under duress, thus rendered legally contested in validity. During several interviews, particularly - though unexclusively - in Afghanistan, I was subjected to pernicious threats of torture, actual vindictive torture and death threats - amongst other coercively employed interrogation techniques. Neither was the presence of legal counsel ever produced or made available.

The said interviews were conducted in an environment of generated fear, resonant with terrifying screams of fellow detainees facing similar methods. In this atmosphere of severe antipathy towards detainees was the compounded use of racially and religiously prejudiced taunts. This culminated, in my opinion, with the deaths of two fellow detainees, at the hands of US military personnel, to which I myself was partially witness.

In spite of all the aforementioned cruel and unusual treatment meted out, I have maintained a compliant and amicable manner with my captors and a cooperative attitude. My behavioural record is impeccable, yet contrasts immensely to what I have experienced, as stated.

I am a law abiding citizen of the UK and attest vehemently to my innocence, before God and the law, of any crime - though none has ever been alleged. I have neither ever met Osama bin Laden, nor been a member of Al Qaida - or any synonymous paramilitary organisation. Neither have I engaged in hostile acts against the USA nor assisted such groups in the same - though the opportunity has availed itself many a time, and motive.

Regardless of the outcome of all my appeals to sanity and protestations over the years, I reiterate my intention to seek justice at every possible level available to me. It is with that intent that I have prepared duplicates of this statement, for the information and use of the authorities and courts of justice.

I have requested this document to be perused by the camp NCO, the generality of its contents be recorded in the camp log and forwarded to the appropriate intended recipient.

Moazzam Begg (00558)

Dated this twelfth day of July, 2004

FIRST UNCENSORED DOCUMENTATION TO COME OUT OF GUANTANAMO BAY DEMONSTRATES THAT MOAZZAM BEGG, BRITISH NATIONAL, HAS BEEN TORTURED

US lawyers seek to prevent further inhumane treatment in Guantanamo Bay

London, 1 October 2004: Attached is a letter written by Moazzam Begg from his prison cell in Guantanamo Bay.

This letter has been declassified by the US Department of Defence, the first time that the rigid rules concerning censorship have let something like this through. The document demonstrates that Mr Begg has been abused and tortured by the US both in Afghanistan (where he was taken by American personnel) and Guantanamo Bay. The evidence provides details of the horrific treatment he has endured for two years, and evidence that the US continues to hold him under inhumane conditions.

The letter was written on 12 July 2004, after the DoD had finally agreed to tell Mr Begg that lawyers were trying to represent him, but six weeks before Mr Begg first met with a lawyer. It is written in his own words, without any prompting. Mr Begg is finally able to tell his counsel and his government (the government of the UK), the following:

Mr Begg was never an “enemy combatant” in Afghanistan. Rather, he was abducted from Pakistan and forcibly removed to Afghanistan by US agents on 31 January 2002. (This took place in front of his wife and child, who can corroborate his letter.) “I am a law abiding citizen of the UK,” he states, “and attest vehemently to my innocence, before God and the law, of any crime - though none has ever been alleged [against me].”

For the year he was held without ever seeing daylight in Afghanistan, he was tortured and witnessed the murder of two other detainees by American forces. He tells how he “was subjected to pernicious threats of torture, actual vindictive torture, and death threats - amongst other coercive interrogation techniques”. This abuse happened in both Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay.

He was interrogated to the echoes of other prisoners’ screams: “The … interviews were conducted in an environment of generated fear, with terrifying screams of fellow detainees facing similar methods.”

He writes how, in Guantanamo Bay in February 2003, FBI agents forced him to sign statements under threat of this torture and of “long term imprisonment, summary trials and execution - all without legal representation”. These statements are the basis for his continued indefinite detention, without charges and without trial.

Since being taken, hooded, across the world to Guantanamo, Mr Begg has been in isolation for almost 600 days - since 8 February 2003. He is being held in a small cell in Camp Echo. There are bars and an almost opaque mesh that divide it from a second half of the same cell, which is where interrogations are to be conducted. There is a monitoring camera above the toilet in his cell that watches him 24 hours a day. The cell is sealed off from the other prisoners, as well as the outside world, under a regime that keeps him in isolation from humanity. Even the very rare Red Cross letters he has received from his eight year old child have been censored.

He has apparently been held in isolation because he was a witness to the two murders (by American service personnel) in Bagram Airforce Base. Thus, he could not reveal the information to any other prisoner, including those who might subsequently be released. While defence counsel cannot reveal the classified information concerning who the victims of murder were, or who the US personnel were who committed these crimes, we do know from the public record at least two prisoners were killed there. The two detainees died at Bagram within a week of each other in December 2002. It must be stressed, however, that the prisoners are not necessarily these two. In the event that the evidence is declassified, it is possible that Mr Begg’s testimony would identify one or more new murders of prisoners in custody, by American military personnel.

Because Gitanjali Gutierrez, one of the US counsel, met with Mr Begg over four days, all of the details of these homicides and of Mr Begg’s torture and abuse are now known to the lawyers who have a security clearance. However, these extensive details remain classified and cannot be revealed.

Mr Begg’s lawyers will respond urgently to this appalling situation in several ways:

First, they will file a legal demand on Monday that the inhumane treatment of Mr Begg cease immediately.

Second, they will demand that the detailed evidence of Mr Begg’s torture be declassified and made public. The Bush administration cannot sanction torture and then create a rule that makes the details of his abuse “classified”, with criminal sanctions if it is not kept secret. How can the torturer claim the right to suppress evidence of the torture?

Third, they will demand that the evidence of two murders by US personnel be declassified and that the perpetrators be brought to account.

Fourth, they will demand that the statements forced from Mr Begg under torture and duress not be used to justify his ongoing detention. As Lord Goldsmith, the British attorney general, has said: “There will always be measures which are not open to governments. Certain rights - for example, the right to life, the prohibition on torture, on slavery - are simply non-negotiable.”

Additionally, they will call for the British government to demand Mr Begg’s immediate repatriation.

Gareth Peirce, counsel for Mr Begg in the UK
Clive Stafford Smith, US counsel for Mr Begg, now in the UK