jameshr4
03-06-2006, 12:28 PM
Guantanamo Briton 'went to fight'
By Francis Harris in Washington
(Filed: 06/03/2006)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/03/06/wguan06.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/03/06/ixworld.html
A British detainee told the American authorities in Guantanamo Bay that he would be "humbled" to be described as an enemy combatant and had left Britain to join armed Islamist groups.
The statements and writings of Feroz Abbasi, from Croydon, south London, were among thousands of pages of papers from the US detention centre in Cuba released by order of the American courts.
Feroz Abbasi: handwritten defence
The Bush administration had asked that they be kept secret.
The 187-page file on Mr Abbasi was one of more than 300 prisoner cases released to the Associated Press after its successful Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. Many of those denied any link to al-Qa'eda and many professed affection for the United States.
Mr Abbasi, who was freed from the camp last year, was one of those apparently proud to describe themselves as Islamist combatants.
In one section of his lengthy handwritten defence, he stated: 'Do not be fooled into thinking I am in any way perturbed by you classifying me as. . . 'enemy combatant'. In fact quite to the contrary I am humbled that Allah would honour me so."
Elsewhere he explained: 'I actually left Britain to either join the Taliban or fight for Allah in [Indian-occupied] Kashmir." Mr Abbasi complained that military police had *** in front of him while he was trying to pray and had tried to explain why he should be considered a prisoner of war and thus entitled to better treatment.
He talked about his "pure hate" for the Americans, which seemed to stem partly from the use of atomic weapons on Japanese civilians in 1945.
At a US military tribunal, he referred to his last will and testament, in which he wrote that he had been driven by a desire to take action against "militarily aggressive Americans and Jews".
Mr Abbasi, who was born in Uganda and raised in Britain, appeared to answer evidence that he had joined a group of hard-core al-Qa'eda fighters at Kandahar airport, Afghanistan, received military training, volunteered for a "martyrdom" mission and met Osama bin Laden.
He and three other British citizens freed from Guantanamo were not charged with criminal offences in Britain.
But the Home Office withdrew their right to hold passports, stating that they would target British or allied interests while abroad.
Mr Abbasi and his lawyer Gareth Peirce have said that he was tortured while in custody and that this tainted evidence which formed the basis of the Home Office decision.
Why was he ever let out and now there is going to be that programme on Channel 4 in the UK, showing them as sweet anmd innocent and caught up in Afganistan by accident!
By Francis Harris in Washington
(Filed: 06/03/2006)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/03/06/wguan06.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/03/06/ixworld.html
A British detainee told the American authorities in Guantanamo Bay that he would be "humbled" to be described as an enemy combatant and had left Britain to join armed Islamist groups.
The statements and writings of Feroz Abbasi, from Croydon, south London, were among thousands of pages of papers from the US detention centre in Cuba released by order of the American courts.
Feroz Abbasi: handwritten defence
The Bush administration had asked that they be kept secret.
The 187-page file on Mr Abbasi was one of more than 300 prisoner cases released to the Associated Press after its successful Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. Many of those denied any link to al-Qa'eda and many professed affection for the United States.
Mr Abbasi, who was freed from the camp last year, was one of those apparently proud to describe themselves as Islamist combatants.
In one section of his lengthy handwritten defence, he stated: 'Do not be fooled into thinking I am in any way perturbed by you classifying me as. . . 'enemy combatant'. In fact quite to the contrary I am humbled that Allah would honour me so."
Elsewhere he explained: 'I actually left Britain to either join the Taliban or fight for Allah in [Indian-occupied] Kashmir." Mr Abbasi complained that military police had *** in front of him while he was trying to pray and had tried to explain why he should be considered a prisoner of war and thus entitled to better treatment.
He talked about his "pure hate" for the Americans, which seemed to stem partly from the use of atomic weapons on Japanese civilians in 1945.
At a US military tribunal, he referred to his last will and testament, in which he wrote that he had been driven by a desire to take action against "militarily aggressive Americans and Jews".
Mr Abbasi, who was born in Uganda and raised in Britain, appeared to answer evidence that he had joined a group of hard-core al-Qa'eda fighters at Kandahar airport, Afghanistan, received military training, volunteered for a "martyrdom" mission and met Osama bin Laden.
He and three other British citizens freed from Guantanamo were not charged with criminal offences in Britain.
But the Home Office withdrew their right to hold passports, stating that they would target British or allied interests while abroad.
Mr Abbasi and his lawyer Gareth Peirce have said that he was tortured while in custody and that this tainted evidence which formed the basis of the Home Office decision.
Why was he ever let out and now there is going to be that programme on Channel 4 in the UK, showing them as sweet anmd innocent and caught up in Afganistan by accident!