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<DIV>It appears that we have lost our free country and it has been taken over by
Bush's "Jack-booted Thugs" lead by Rumsfeld with Bush's blessing.. It is time to
take our country back. This is not the country I was born into. We are being led
by a bunch of whores who answer only to money.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Dick Schmidt</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>
<H1><FONT color=#00366f size=4>Briton freed from Guantanamo prison tells
European rights body of U.S. abuse </FONT><BR><FONT size=2><I>10:48 PM EST Dec
17</I></FONT> </H1>
<P><!-- CPPara1-->PARIS (AP) - A Briton released from the U.S. prison camp at
Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, told Europe's top human rights body Friday he was beaten,
shackled, kept in a cramped cage and fed rotten food as part of "systematic
abuse" in custody. <!-- CPPara1End-->
<P><!-- CPPara2-->Jamal al-Harith's testimony before a Council of Europe panel
came as part of an inquiry by the body into human rights abuses at the U.S.
prison camp to be made public in a report due out early next year. <!-- CPPara2End-->
<P><!-- CPPara3-->Reading from a 10-page statement, al-Harith described his
two-year detention at Guantanamo Bay as a period of continual mistreatment that
ranged from humiliation and 15-hour interrogations to physical abuse he said
left scars. <!-- CPPara3End-->
<P>At one point, al-Harith said he refused to take an unidentified injection and
was chained up and attacked by five men wearing helmets, body armour and
shields.
<P>"They jumped on my legs and back and they kicked and punched me," said the
37-year-old website designer and father of three from Manchester, England.
<P>"Then I was put in isolation for a month."
<P>Al-Harith said he was kept mostly in a wire cage and given food marked "10 to
12 years beyond their usable date," as well as "black and rotten" fruit.
Sometimes, unmuzzled dogs were brought to the cage and encouraged to bark, he
said.
<P>Detained in Afghanistan in October 2001, al-Harith maintains he had travelled
to the region to attend a religious retreat in Pakistan.
<P>He and three other Britons were released in March and have filed a lawsuit in
a U.S. court seeking $10 million each in damages. Never charged, they maintain
they were innocents caught up in the U.S. war on terrorism. They were denied
access to lawyers, as are most prisoners in Guantanamo.
<P>When al-Harith and the others filed their lawsuits in October, the Pentagon
denied the abuse allegations and said the men were properly held in Guantanamo
after being captured in Afghanistan and having fought for al-Qaida.
<P>"The U.S. policy is to treat all detainees and to conduct interrogations,
wherever they may occur, is in a manner consistent with all U.S. legal
obligations," Maj. Michael Shavers, a Pentagon spokesman, said at the time.
<P>Robert Lizar, al-Harith's lawyer, urged the panel to use strong language in
its report and to condemn U.S. behaviour at Guantanamo that he called "totally
shocking and unacceptable from international norms."
<P>"The actions are closer to those of kidnappers and bandits, than to those of
a state with a strong tradition of liberty and due process," Lizar said.
<P>Al-Harith said during long interrogations, he was given no choice but to
urinate on the floor and repeatedly threatened or asked to confess to crimes he
had not committed in exchange for a payoff.
<P>Interrogators threatened to seize his family's home, unless he admitted to
having gone to Pakistan to buy drugs or to become involved with terrorism,
al-Harith said.
<P>"On another occasion, the interrogators promised me money, a car, a house, a
job if I admitted those things," he said.
<P>"I refused."
<P>During questioning, al-Harith said he was placed in shackles that prevented
him from standing upright and cut into his flesh, leaving scars on his wrists
and ankles.
<P>Similar abuses are detailed in a memo obtained exclusively by The Associated
Press this month that suggests the U.S. Defence Department has done nothing
about FBI complaints of "highly aggressive" interrogations reported as early as
2002. The memo quotes a U.S. marine telling an FBI observer some interrogations
led to prisoners "curling into a fetal position on the floor and crying in
pain."
<P>Kevin McNamara, who presided over Friday's hearing for the council, said the
global fight against terrorism should not be used as an excuse to violate basic
human rights, the right to a fair trial and the rule of law.
<P>"Hundreds of what must be presumed to be innocent people remain in
indeterminate detention in Guantanamo Bay," he said.
<P>"By all accounts, the abuse continues."
<P>McNamara said the council plans to publish its report on the subject in the
early months of 2005. <BR></P></DIV></BODY></HTML>