Time Runs Out for an Afghan Held by the U.S.(Dies at Gitmo)

[RamboLiberal]

Source: NY Times

Abdul Razzaq Hekmati was regarded here as a war hero, famous for his resistance to the Russian occupation in the 1980s and later for a daring prison break he organized for three opponents of the Taliban government in 1999.

But in 2003, Mr. Hekmati was arrested by American forces in southern Afghanistan when, senior Afghan officials here contend, he was falsely accused by his enemies of being a Taliban commander himself. For the next five years he was held at the American military base in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, where he died of cancer on Dec. 30.

The fate of Mr. Hekmati, the first detainee to die of natural causes at Guantánamo, who fruitlessly recounted his story several times to American officials, demonstrates the enduring problems of the tribunals at Guantánamo, say Afghan officials and others who knew him.

Afghan officials, and some Americans, complain that detainees are effectively thwarted from calling witnesses in their defense, and that the Afghan government is never consulted on the detention cases, even when it may be able to help. Mr. Hekmati’s case, officials who knew him said, shows that sometimes the Americans do not seem to know whom they are holding. Meanwhile, detainees wait for years with no resolution to their cases.



Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/05/world/asia/05gitmo.html?hp

[PSPS]

1. "the first detainee to die of natural causes at Guantánamo"

The rest who have died were murdered by their captors.

[Hyper_Eye]

3. There were some suicides

There has supposedly been many attempted and a few successful suicides. We can't know for sure that they were all actually suicide and we can't know how many were tortured to the point of suicide.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guantanamo_suicide_attempts

[ursi]

4. more blood on Bush's hands ...and the bastard is oblivious

[aquart]

5. No. The blood is on OUR hands.

We stood still for it.

[cstanleytech]

9. Ok then,

other than voting for someone else who we feel will do a better job in regards to such such a sitution and stop it from happening what would you suggest then?

[atreides1]

15. WE??????

You got a mouse in your pocket? WE did what we could, it was the members of the US Congress who failed, it was the supporters of George Bush, those bigoted lobotomized idiots who failed as human beings.

Their is no WE, if you want to take responsibility for a policy that none of us here were able to affect and were against, then by all means go for it!!!

But, don't include the rest of us in your delusions, okay.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

2. a soldier who was in Afghanistan

told me that they couldn't go into a village without people trying to turn in random people trying to claim that every local nuisance was a high ranking bin laden deputy either to get rid of the person or just collect a reward.

[Judi Lynn]

6. Sounds like they REALLY screwed this one up. He should have been one of the LAST people

to end up in a _Bush torture chamber. What a shame.

From the article:

Hajji Wali, who knew Mr. Hekmati well, said: “It was the Americans’ mistake. I know he had no relations with the Taliban.”

Yet the Americans on his tribunal and review boards seemed unaware of how significant the prison break was, or how important were the men he had helped escape and whom he had asked to be called as witnesses.

Also:

As the Taliban has reasserted itself in much of southern Afghanistan, Mr. Hekmati’s son remains in hiding. Neither he nor any relative or elder of their tribe collected his father’s body.

“He is caught in the middle,” said Hajji Wali, a family friend. “He is scared of the Taliban and scared of the government and the Americans, because the Americans took his innocent father and they could take him, too.”

_Bush and his evil empire do not deserve forgiveness for any part of this filthy war on humanity. They simply have lost their rights to a peaceful life after destroying the lives of so many helpless people, in their shabby, vicious theft of power not rightfully theirs.

[leftchick]

7. Disgusting. American Gulag!

<snip>

Several high-ranking officials in President Hamid Karzai’s government say Mr. Hekmati’s detention at Guantánamo was a gross mistake. They were mentioned by Mr. Hekmati in his hearings and could have vouched for him. Records from the hearings show that only a cursory effort was made to reach them.

Two of those officials were men Mr. Hekmati had helped escape from the Taliban’s top security prison in Kandahar in 1999: Ismail Khan, now the minister of energy; and Hajji Zaher, a general in the Border Guards. Both men said they appealed to American officials about Mr. Hekmati’s case, but to no effect.

“What he did was very important for all Afghan people who were against the Taliban,” Hajji Zaher said of Mr. Hekmati’s role in organizing his prison break. “He was not a man to take to Guantánamo.”

Hajji Zaher, whose father served as vice president under Mr. Karzai for six months, warned that the case of Mr. Hekmati, who is widely known here by his nickname, Baraso, would discourage Afghans from backing the government against the Taliban. “No one is going to help the government,” he said.

[cstanleytech]

8. So what, he was being held in Gitmo

so that means he was guilty thus why all the tears becuase we all know only guilty people are held in Gitmo and waterboarded
/end imitation of typical far righter

[99th_Monkey]

10. Gitmo: Terrorist Manufacturing Incorporated

A necessary component of endless war, is doing your damnedest to insure an endless supply of "enemies".

That's the sole purpose of Gitmo, the renditions and the all the needless torture ... to not-so-subtly
declare endless war against all of Islam.

[truthisfreedom]

11. Lethal injection

would be far too gentle for them after the Hague pronounces them guilty on all charges.

[Demeter]

13. Agreed. But First We Have to Get Them There

Maybe if somebody said it was Norway and the Nobel Award Ceremonies?

[Warren Stupidity]

12. Life without parole, or any actual charges, or a jury of his peers,

or consul, or habeus corpus, or....

Sweet land of liberty...

[Solly Mack]

14. Criminal...nothing but criminal

[Peace Patriot]

16. While our political establishment plays its hideously rigged political games,

in which the voices against unjust war, torture, detention without trial, the shredding of our Constitution, the Geneva Conventions, the Uniform Code of Military Justice, international law and all human decency, and against the looting of our treasury, and all manor of crimes, go unheard-- excluded from debates, marginalized by diminishing news coverage, unable to raise funds, criticized for being too short or for the cost of their haircuts, a life passes away in Guantanamo Bay, and we hardly have time to think, "why was he there?," and we have never heard his name before, or anything of the substanceless charges against him, or what his compadres in his faraway home, or his own government, had to say about him, that he was innocent.

A blip of news in the New York Times. Like the "Count of Monte Cristo," his beard grew long, he suffered in his cell, he no doubt nearly went mad at times, perhaps he was tortured, perhaps not, and who knows what he really died of (do they experiment on those prisoners?), but if the U.S. military is not lying this time, he died of time itself, an immensely sad death isolated from all he knew, and, unlike that western hero and ikon of rebirth, the "Count" of the mythical land of "Monte Cristo," he never had a chance to put things right, he never saw the sun again, could not escape, never found hidden treasure, never was able to confront his false accusers, never had a chance. This U.S. fascist junta gave him no chance. They are murderers and criminals in the highest degree. And all our glory and all our royalist pomp and all the honor that we can bestow, and all the tooting military bands, and all the stern, focused Secret Service folk, and all the war profiteering corporate news monopoly obeisance, are lauded upon the persons who have committed these awful crimes, and they call them "President of the United States," or "Vice President of the United States," or "United States Secretary of Defense," and they are treated like kings, like gods--the greedy, nasty little men who have destroyed everything we hold dear.

And our "candidates" are all smiles tonight, those who won the "trade secret" vote counting contest, and get a shot at being crowned emperor, and having all that power over others--the power to imprison and torture, the power to slaughter a million people to get their oil, the deadly power to wipe out entire countries, and all life on earth, by lifting a finger. Abdul Razzaq Hekmati is no one to them. A meaningless drop in the bloody bucket.

Ah, it is all so immensely saddening. I feel Abdul Razzaq Hekmati's sadness, as he thought of some little mountain flower back in Afghanistan and took his last breath. They never gave him a chance.

I'm glad that I read of him, though, and at least know his name. It puts everything into perspective.

"...the enduring problems of the tribunals at Guantánamo"..."say Afghan officials." How antiseptically the NYT puts it. And where are those "enduring problems" anywhere mentioned in the Democratic or Republican campaigns for emperor?

[Demeter]

17. I Want to Recommend This--But I Can't!

Can you repost in Editorials?

[Peace Patriot]

18. Well, thanks, Demeter! I posted it my journal. I will post it in Editorials, if

they let me. I don't know the rules there. If not, in GD.

[Peace Patriot]

20. Demeter, here's my post of it, in Editorials

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x336222

[Judi Lynn]

19. Haven't heard a word from them on these "eduring problems." Not a peep.

How sad it is so few people have grasped the awareness of the simple WRONGNESS of holding these people without charges, and with no intention of looking for the truth.

Everything about this man's story says he should have NEVER been there.

No doubt you're very close to the reality of how his life was finally emptied. How painful that had to be when he realized he wouldn't be leaving and returning to his only real home.

Powerful writing. I was in tears, and I'm sure others were, too, if they really paid attention.

I'll be listening harder, now, to see if FINALLY we hear a candidate taking some time from a busy day to address this "enduring problem."

[Demeter]

21. "Simple Wrongness" Not So Simple For US Citizens

I'm on a co-op board these past 5 years, and I am amazed at how the management company we hired truckles to the most venal, corrupt and amoral members of the board, instead of demonstrating some principle and saying something to the effect of: "That's not going to work" or "that's wrong" or even "that's not cost effective". The only point at which the designated point guy will express anything like a standard is when a lawsuit is threatened, and he's always against engaging in one, even if it's to the co-op's benefit, and the facts are on our side. It's only one person, but he's the one we have to work with, and it's getting tiring. We will soon be in a position to cut lose and manage ourselves, and I am looking forward to that day.

[Peace Patriot]

22. It's important to feel it. Very, very important. And important to keep returning

to the perspective of the victims of our political establishment. But I just had a thought that chills me--that slaps me with ice water--and it is this: Abdul Razzaq Hekmati fought against the Russians, and who set all that up? The Bush Cartel and the CIA. So, it may be that the reason for his long, unjust imprisonment is not neglect and inhuman callousness, but rather, he knew something of the Bush/Al Qaeda connection and could not be let free, to potentially blow their cover. He may have been just a patriot, angry at the Russians, and used by the CIA/Bushites, in their geo-political games. But he was a well-known fighter, so may have been privy to some things. Did they pick him up deliberately for this reason? Is this why they were deaf to pleas from his friends, and even from their own puppet government in Afghanistan? It makes his plight no less sad and unforgivable. But it points to a MOTIVE for the torture, the black flights, and the refusal to do trials, and to let the prisoners have any outside contact, that has occurred to me before: that, a) the captures and incarcerations were very targeted--to cover Cheney/Rumsfeld tracks to certain things, and b) that some amount of the detainee population is random, as cover for that that. I don't believe for a moment that the Bush Junta does anything to "keep us safe." So what are their motives for doing all of this? Abdul Razzaq Hekmati could be one of the random ones--the cover. And the mystification of his friends and official advocates, and his own mystification, as to why they were keeping him in prison, points that way--it seems genuine--but perhaps he himself never knew what they were really after (if they tortured him), or what it was, about him, that they were afraid of.

This is, of course, the horror of secret prisons and secret trials. He may truly have had no idea why he was there, because the motive was so obscured by Bush Junta crimes, and lies about their crimes--layers and layers of criminality and lies. It's how witches got burned for "commerce with the Devil."