A detainee at the US prison at Guantanamo who was used as a guinea pig for the Central Intelligence Agency's (CIA) torture program has produced the most extensive and detailed account of the brutal techniques he was subjected to.
Abu Zubaydah, as reported by the British "Guardian", made a series of 40 drawings in which he recorded the torture he was subjected to at several CIA secret locations between 2002 and 2006 in Guantanamo. In the absence of official reports and information about the torture program, which the CIA and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) tried to keep secret, these drawings represent a unique and striking insight into a terrible period in American history, the British newspaper points out.
The drawings, with Zubajda's comments, describe the brutal acts of violence, sexual and religious humiliation, and prolonged psychological terror committed against him and other prisoners. The drawings were done from memory in his Guantanamo cell and then sent to one of his lawyers, Mark Denbow. Along with his students at the Center for Policy and Research at Seton Hall University Law School, Denbo compiled Zubaydah's drawings and descriptions and compiled a report. "The Guardian" published a report entitled "American Torture: Abuses by the CIA and FBI at Secret Sites and Guantanamo".
"Abu Zubaydah is an example of what the American torture program looks like," said Denbo. “He is the first person to be tortured with the approval of the Department of Justice based on information that the CIA knew to be false.
The report comes at a crucial time for Zubaydah, who remains in Guantanamo. He is known as the "eternal prisoner", because he was neither charged with a crime nor offered any possibility of release.
Last week, a UN body called for his immediate release, arguing that his imprisonment could be a crime against humanity. His international legal representative, Helen Duffy, told The Guardian that the drawings were a powerful representation of what was happening to him.
Everyone agrees, they tortured the wrong man; but still they continued so that they could get permission to torture other people as well
Denbo added that the combination of the UN intervention and the new drawings offer a glimmer of hope. "The only thing that kept him in prison was silence and darkness, and now the sun is rising above the eternal prisoner," Denbo said.
Zubaydah's drawings provide a unique visual record of the torture used by the US government after 11/6700. CIA torture videos were destroyed despite a court order, while a XNUMX-page report on torture compiled by the Senate Intelligence Committee remains classified nearly a decade after it was produced.
Although the Senate report was never published, the conclusion is known: the abuse of Zubajda and other prisoners did not result in new information. In other words, torture doesn't work.
Zubajda, 52, was arrested in Pakistan in March 2002 and transferred to several secret CIA locations in Poland, Lithuania and elsewhere. He was transferred to Guantanamo in 2006, "The Guardian" reminds.
The US initially claimed that he was a top Al Qaeda operative but was forced to admit that he was not even a member of the terrorist group. “Everyone agrees, they tortured the wrong man; but they continued anyway so that they could get permission to torture other people as well", said Denbo.
Zubaydah's descriptions are so precise that a team at Seton Hall University masked the faces of CIA and FBI agents to protect their identities. They reveal the extent to which the US government violated international law and even its own guidelines in what it called "enhanced interrogation techniques."
Among the drawings published by the "Guardian" is the one showing masked agents threatening Zubaida with rape. He showed a series of extremely violent techniques to which he was subjected. In one drawing, he showed himself shackled and naked sitting in front of a woman interrogating him, then guards threatening to desecrate the Koran - techniques never officially approved by the Justice Department.
Zubajda also drew what the simulated drowning techniques he was subjected to 83 times look like. He described various variations of the technique, including one in which he was confined in a crate which was then filled with water up to his nose. He spent the whole day there "fearing he would drown", he wrote. He drew and described what the torture looked like with beatings, cold, starvation, force-feeding, threats with a drill.
Zubayda's drawings and comments describe the abuses to which Zubayda was personally subjected as the first victim of the American torture program. However, Denbo said that his client created the material not only to highlight his own suffering but also the suffering of many who are subjected to the same techniques.
At least 2014 people were subjected to the same program, according to a 119 Senate summary report.
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