Guantanamo translators arrested
Does Pentagon fear exposure?
By Deirdre Griswold
How many prisoners is the Pentagon holding at
Guantanamo? How and why were they seized? What is their
physical condition?
Why have over 30 attempted suicide? Have any died in
custody?
Are they being charged with any crime? How long will they be
held? What are their names, their ages? What countries and
towns do they come from?
What have they told their interrogators? What methods have
been used to make them talk?
None of this information is available to the public. All of
it is concealed as "classified" by the Pentagon and U.S.
government--which have invented a legal limbo for these
prisoners, calling them "enemy combatants."
The last estimate in the press of how many are being held
this way was 660 people. Most were captured during the U.S.
invasion and war against Afghanistan--a very undeveloped
country that has been wracked with wars ever since 1979. That
was when the Carter administration decided to organize armed
opposition to the new progressive regime there. Then, six
months later, the Soviet Union intervened on the side of the
secular government.
Washington later incurred the anger of its fundamentalist
allies when it dumped them after the Soviet Union had pulled
out its troops.
Then came Sept. 11, 2001, and the U.S. government eagerly
used the attacks as a justification to invade Afghanistan. It
was the first test case of the aggressive Bush Doctrine and an
opportunity for the Pentagon to test out and show off the power
of its new weaponry.
Many Afghans and others were captured during this uneven war
between a pre-industrial country and the world's mightiest
military power. Those flown to Guantanamo--a U.S. base imposed
on Cuba--have been held for almost two years in cages, on the
other side of the world and in a climate just the opposite of
what they are used to.
When seen in rare photos they are in chains and shackles,
sometimes with hoods over their heads, being propped up by
soldiers on either side.
Now the Pentagon has arrested three of the translators it
used at Guantanamo. All three are Muslims and are U.S.
citizens.
Air Force Senior Airman Ahmad I. Al-Halabi was arrested July
23. He is charged with attempted espionage and trying to aid
the enemy. The Pentagon claims he tried to pass more than 180
notes from Guantanamo detainees, as well as a map of the prison
and flight paths, to "a citizen of a foreign government by
carrying such notes en route to Syria, a foreign nation." If
convicted in a court-martial, he could get the death
penalty.
His lawyers say he is innocent and that his trip to Syria,
his country of birth, was to marry a woman there.
Ahmed Fathy Mehalba, also an interpreter at the camp, was
arrested on Sept. 29. He was charged with giving false
statements to federal authorities. He was taken into custody at
Logan International Airport in Boston, where officials say they
found him carrying classified material, including compact discs
with information about Guantanamo.
The nature of this information is being kept secret. Was it,
perhaps, names of the prisoners so that their loved ones could
finally know what had happened to them?
The third arrest was of Capt. James Y. Yee, a Muslim
chaplain and Army West Point graduate. He has not been charged,
but is under suspicion of having attempted to bring "classified
material" out of the base. Yee was arrested at the naval air
station in Jacksonville, Fla., on Sept. 10.
The commercial media are reporting all this as though the
only possible issue here is espionage, a threat to U.S.
"national security," the "war on terror."
Not one has even mentioned the possibility that these
translators may have been moved by the deplorable conditions of
their Muslim brothers, may have been revolted by the chain-link
curtain of silence meant to isolate them from their families
and compatriots, and may have wanted to let at least their
relatives, and perhaps the rest of the world, know what is
going on there.
True, this is only speculation. Maybe nothing happened.
Maybe these men have been totally set up in order to scare off
any attempts from whatever quarter to reveal what is happening
behind the barbed wire of Camp Delta.
But if they were carrying messages from the prisoners, or
lists of their names, it is likely that these U.S. career
officers couldn't stand being a part of this vicious repression
any more and acted out of sympathy and compassion for their
fellow human beings.
Since everything about the prison at Guantanamo has been
kept secret and "classified," even information about who the
prisoners are and what has happened to them is also
"classified." If there are court-martials, will the military
present for open scrutiny the presumed evidence against the
translators--or will that, too, be a military secret?
At the end of August, lawyers from 10 countries sent an open
letter to the United States calling for civilian trials for the
translators. There is no way they can receive a fair trial in a
military court under these circumstances.
Reprinted from the Oct. 16, 2003, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyright under a Creative
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