Day 18 - Free Someone Today

I was going to free some more ladybugs but since the thermometer outside has dipped to 29 degrees this morning that would be more like "executing a ladybug today". Also, probably because of the cold, the ladybugs have pretty much disappeared.

I turned to the old "save someone" standby - Amnesty International.

Read the following article:

Secret detentions in the “war on terror”

Imagine that one minute you are eating dinner with your family and the next you are hooded, handcuffed, and dragged away. Your family is not told where you were taken. After your initial interrogation, you are taken to a plane: it takes off, but no one tells you where it’s going and when it lands you don’t even know what country you’re in.

You are put in a cell, completely isolated, with no windows and only a bucket for a toilet. Artificial lights are on all the time and a constant low-level hum comes out of the loudspeakers. You cannot sleep and feel very anxious. The guards, dressed completely in black, communicate only with hand gestures. Interrogators insult you about the things most sacred to you and make you stand motionless for long periods of time. You feel like you are going mad and just want this to stop. And to make matters worse, you still haven’t been told why you are there, nor are you allowed to speak to a lawyer or your family. No one knows where you are.

You may have to imagine such a situation, but someone like Muhammad al-Assad has actually lived through similar experiences.

Enter into Muhammad al-Assad’s world. He was “disappeared” for almost 16 months and has recently reappeared in Yemen.

In the US administration’s “war on terror”, Muhammad al-Assad is just one of the countless many who have been held secretly, in incommunicado detention and subjected to torture or ill-treatment at the hands of US officials.

Help Muhammad al-Assad by writing to US and Yemeni authorities. Take action to ensure that he is released unless he is to be charged with an internationally recognizable criminal offence. If he is charged, then he must be brought to trial in a reasonable time and in full accordance with international standards, without recourse to the death penalty.

Read the full report

So, I wrote a letter (sort of).

Dear Secretary of State Rice:

I am deeply concerned at the use of secret detention facilities, also known as “black sites,” that facilitate a policy of “disappearance”, secret transfer and secret incommunicado detention pursuant to US administration’s “war on terror”.
The case of Muhammad Abdullah Salah al-Assad illustrates this point. Muhammad al-Assad, a Yemeni national resident in Tanzania, was seized by Tanzanian authorities in December 2003. Reports indicate that he was handed over to US officials and interrogated in a series of secret detention centres abroad. He was detained incommunicado for 16 months. The treatment he recounts while in the final detention centre corroborates with testimony given to Amnesty International by Salah Nasser Salim ‘Ali and Muhammad Faraj Ahmed Bashmillah about their detention in a covert US-run facility. All three men were transferred to Yemen in May 2005 where they remain in detention, without charge or trial.
The Yemeni authorities told Amnesty International that the US Embassy in Sana’a had notified them of the three men’s transfer to Yemen and given explicit instructions not to release them. The authorities claim that they are “awaiting files” from the US authorities, so that they can bring them to trial. A high-ranking Yemeni political security official said that the three men would be released if requested by the US administration.
Secrecy has characterised the US-led “war on terror,” from the hiding of detainees in Afghanistan and Iraq, the practice of rendition, to the USA’s refusal to provide exact details of who is held at Guantánamo Bay. The use of these “black sites” to facilitate indefinite and incommunicado detention of suspects is just the latest example of such policies.

Madame Secretary, I urge you to:
- Disclose the location and status of the detention centres where Muhammad Abdullah Salah al-Assad, Muhammad Faraj Ahmed Bashmilah and Salah Nasser Salim ‘Ali were held; disclose the identities and whereabouts of all others held at these places and their legal status, and invite the ICRC to have full and regular access to those detained;

- End immediately the practices of incommunicado and secret detention wherever it is occurring, and under whatever agency;

- Hold detainees only in officially recognized places of detention with access to family, lawyers and courts;

- Ensure that any person alleged to have perpetrated an act of “disappearance” should, when the facts disclosed by an official investigation so warrant, be brought before the competent civil authorities for prosecution and trial, in accordance with Article 14 of the UN Declaration on the Protection of all Persons from Enforced Disappearance;

- Clarify the current legal status of former secret detainees Muhammad Abdullah Salah al-Assad, Muhammad Faraj Ahmed Bashmilah and Salah Nasser Salim ‘Ali. If US policy is to relinquish all custody and control over detainees transferred to the control of another government, it should state clearly that this is the case with regard to these three men, and emphasise that there are no US conditions attached to their transfer;

- State clearly that there are no conditions attached to the transfer of Walid Muhammad Shahir Muhammad al-Qadasi, who was released from Guantánamo in April 2004, and who remains in detention in Yemen without charge or trial;

- Withdraw all requests or demands to the Yemeni government for the continued detention of persons, unless it is with a view to prompt prosecution for internationally recognizable criminal offences and in accordance with international standards for fair trial;

- Release all detainees in US custody at undisclosed locations unless they are to be charged with internationally recognizable criminal offences and brought to trial promptly and fairly, in full accordance with relevant international standards, and without recourse to the death penalty;

- Reaffirm the prohibition on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, and make it clear to all officials involved in the treatment or interrogation of detainees and prisoners that such acts are prohibited absolutely and anyone who engages in such acts will be prosecuted;

- Investigate all allegations of torture and other ill-treatment of Muhammad Abdullah Salah al-Assad, Muhammad Faraj Ahmed Bashmilah and Salah Nasser Salim ‘Ali and ensure that anyone found responsible is brought to justice;

- Prohibit the return or transfer of persons to places where they are at risk of torture or other ill-treatment;

- Provide full reparation including restitution, compensation and rehabilitation, and satisfaction.

The USA must end the practice of secret detention. Not only do such conditions encourage torture and ill-treatment, but to be "disappeared" from the face of the earth without knowing why or for how long is a crime under international law and is an experience no family and no one should have to go through.

Thank you for your attention.


Yours sincerely,
Stephanie Buck


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