[AicapAifap] Guantánamo

Thu Feb 15 13:29:37 PST 2018

Guantánamo
Tortured al-Qaida snitch gets shrimp, strawberry Oreos and U.S.
sitcoms at Guantánamo
By Carol Rosenberg
crosenberg at miamiherald.com 
February 11, 2018 09:37 AM 
Updated February 12, 2018 01:28 PM 
GUANTANAMO BAY NAVY BASE, Cuba A tortured al-Qaida terrorist turned
prosecution witness is being rewarded with a comfortable cabin-style
lockup where he can garden, paint, exercise, learn English by Rosetta
Stone, cook meals for his interrogators and attorneys and watch
American comedy TV.
In sworn testimony on Saturday Ahmed al Darbi, 42, described morphing
from a lying, feces-flinging prisoner with a bad behavior record in
the maximum-security Camp Five prison to a cooperating witness now
cloistered in Camp Echo, an annex of the prison compound across the
street.
Darbi has his own kitchen with a freezer stocked with meat and spices,
and other never-before-disclosed perks to pass his time preparing to
testify as a witness for the war court prosecutor in two cases, one
that seeks the death-penalty.
The prison provides him with lamb, rabbit, chicken, shrimp and other
halal meat, he agreed, as defense attorney Air Force Maj. Yolanda
Miller read from what sounded like a shopping list.
“Goat,” the stout Saudi in a dark blue suit and tie volunteered
with a grin, adding, “I love chicken, and I don’t see any issue
with that. I still have it in my freezer until now.”
Darbi, 42, is slated to go home to a Saudi rehabilitation program Feb.
20 under an Obama-era plea agreement, if diplomats can close the deal
and Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis approves the release. Four years
ago he pleaded guilty to being an accomplice in a 2002 al-Qaida attack
on a French oil tanker, the Limburg, in Yemeni waters. 
It did not achieve its goal of upsetting global oil prices or
shipping, but a Bulgarian crew member died in the attack, which
occurred after Darbi was already a U.S. prisoner. Last year he
recorded testimony, a deposition, to be used as possible evidence
against the alleged mastermind of the attack, Abd al Rahim al Nashiri.

He also separately testified about his life as a jihadist in al-Qaida,
pointed to an Iraqi captive in court and identified him as a former
al-Qaida commander named Abd al Hadi al Iraqi, to counter the
Iraqi’s claim that his true name is Nashwan al Tamir. 

This weekend, Hadi’s attorneys were questioning Darbi on the
truthfulness of his statements and memory for what could be used as
time-capsule testimony if the Trump administration releases him. And
the image he portrayed of his life in Guantánamo prison offered a
stark contrast to a glimpse a weekend earlier of medium-security
communal prison life — prepared food in Styrofoam containers, up to
four hours in a new recreation cell block, a now hidden art program
for the indefinite detainees known as “forever prisoners.”
Across the street, Darbi has a plethora of quality-of-life
accommodations provided by the prison, interrogators or the
prosecution. Cilantro, cumin and cloves to cook with using a hotplate,
blender and microwave in his kitchen; treats like Strawberries n’
Creme Oreos, baklava, Turkish delight and a pecan pie; a garden where
he said he was growing what sounded like the ingredients for
ratatouille — eggplant, tomatoes, zucchini and green pepper. Papaya
too, he noted.
Cooperation also earned him monthly phone calls with his Yemeni wife
and children, now living in Saudi Arabia.
Deposition questioning Sunday delved into what Darbi called “the
torture times” — his 2002-03 interrogations in Bagram,
Afghanistan, and here at Guantánamo.
Defense attorney Adam Thurschwell, in an apparent bid to discredit
Darbi’s identification of the Iraqi Hadi, led Darbi through a lurid
description of his first year or more in U.S. custody, drawn from
sworn court documents. The Saudi was beaten, sleep deprived, hung by
the wrists, threatened with rape in interrogation then sent to
unwanted rectal exams by U.S. military doctors, kept nude and forced
to empty other detainees’ feces buckets with his fingers.
He said a focus of the interrogations was, Where was Osama bin Laden?
In one notorious episode, Darbi described how, after he cried out for
God while he was being beaten and questioned at Bagram, a U.S. soldier
serving as an interrogator pulled out his own penis, put it “very
close to my face” and declared, “This is your God.” 
The Saudi said he was kept shackled to the door of a cage there, his
toes unable to touch the ground and in plain sight of what Darbi
called the guards’ “torture tools” — baseball bats, chains,
shackles and hoods.
Darbi got to Guantánamo 14 months after it opened. He testified
Sunday that he was kept in solitary confinement, deprived of sleep and
subjected to midnight-to-dawn, no-bathroom-break questioning in an
interrogation room stinking of urine and vomit. Threats here included
to rape him, to send him to Israel or Camp X-Ray, which supposedly
closed a year earlier. Interrogators had photo copies of pages of the
Quran, Darbi testified, and would throw them on the ground with sex
photos and pictures of mutilated bodies.
Darbi looked morose Sunday, describing it as a period of helplessness
and hopelessness unlike more cheerful testimony about his previously
unheard of list of special “comfort items,” as the prison calls
items it can take away for bad behavior. It sounded as though
interrogators and prosecutors went on a shopping spree at the
Guantánamo commissary for base residents, and supplemented their
goodies with online purchases.
Darbi has a battery-powered Oral B Pro Health toothbrush, with
replacement heads, a Magic Bullet blender, free weights and a spin
bike for exercising, and Under Armour T-shirts and athletic socks to
wear when he works out in his compound. “Yes, Nike also,” he told
Miller. “Don’t forget that.”
Miller, Hadi’s defense attorney, framed the stuff as incentive items
to show that life gets good for captives turned prosecution witnesses
at Guantánamo Bay. Darbi confirmed under questioning that he would
set a table and cook for his interrogators during some visits, and
that he had the makings for Arabic and Turkish coffee. 
Also, Brazilian, Lebanese, Iranian, Saudi and Yemeni coffee, he
offered through Arabic-English translation.
“As you understand it, you’re set to go home in 10 days,” Air
Force major Miller asked.
“Supposedly, yes,” Darbi replied.
Miller: “As long as you tell the government what it wants to
hear.”
Darbi: “What’s requested is the truth and nothing but the
truth.”
In the more than four years since he agreed to plead guilty, he also
got a personal laptop computer equipped with Rosetta Stone software to
learn English; oil paints, canvas and special brushes; a PlayStation 3
and, by request, some interrogators rented for him old episodes of the
situation comedy “Arrested Development,” now available on Netflix.
The program portrays a dysfunctional American family. It first aired
on FOX TV during Darbi’s early years as a U.S. military prisoner,
the period when he testified he was tortured and lied to his
interrogators. 
Read more here:
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/guantanamo/article199561044.html#storylink=cpy
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