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It looks like he was an accomplice to the person they originally mistook him for. Not just a random taxi driver / guy in the street. They mistook him because of

It looks like he was an accomplice to the person they originally mistook him for. Not just a random taxi driver / guy in the street. They mistook him because of where he was and what he was doing, presumably running a safe house and being (taxi?) driver to senior operatives. Not mistaken because of looks, and maybe not as innocent as he makes it sound in the article. He's not the bad guy they originally thought he was, but still a bad guy, or at least was working for the bad guy. Not advocating for torture, and not necessarily saying it's true, just presenting the other side. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/af/ISN_01461%2C_Mohammed_Ahmad_Rabbani%27s_Guantanamo_detainee_assessment.pdf https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/af/ISN_0146...

jacquesm 7y ago
There is no other side: either they arrested him for cause or they did not. Arresting someone thinking they are someone else should automatically result in a release and in this case probably compensation. You are 'just presenting the other side' in the same way that news organizations will pretend to be balanced by presenting two sides of an argument which has already been resolved as though there is some kind of controversy that needs to be kept alive. So, either he was 'a bad guy', let's see the charges, or it was a case of mistaken identity. It does not look like there is much middle ground here.
- beerandt 7y ago
  1) If the cops get a tip that Bonnie is hiding out in a house, and they raid it only to find Clyde alone, they're going to still arrest him. Even if it takes them time to figure out that Clyde is -in fact- Clyde, and that he isn't Bonnie. Same goes for a senior member of Al Qaeda and his driver/messenger/accomplice. 2) This isn't about his character or being "good" vs "bad". This is about whether he knowingly provided material support to Al Qaeda or enemy combatants. The leaked report I linked to makes a compelling (to me) case that he repeatedly attempted to join and assist militant jihad groups, including after being jailed for it in Pakistan. 3) That said, none of it justifies torture, and none of it justifies denying him the right to a trial, be it military or civilian.
  - jacquesm 7y ago
    You apparently did not read the linked article, so let me repeat a couple of salient points: (1) the guy was not arrested in some house after a raid but sold by kidnappers to the Americans being told that he was someone else. (2) he wasn't the 'driver/messenger/accomplice' of anybody interesting, he was a cab driver with a pregnant wife minding his own business Note that because there is no trial that none of the above has ever been countered so that's the only evidence there is. If the other side has a story it wishes to tell it's had 17 years and counting to do so. The only apparent reason why he is still there is because the people in charge are scared that he will sue them (and rightly so). It's a case of perverse incentives gone bad, not a case of catching 'Bonnie' when looking for 'Clyde'.
    - beerandt 7y ago
      >You apparently did not read the linked article Really? C'mon man... The "article" that's a letter written by the detainee? I read it. In detail. I'm saying consider a source other than the detainee. I'm about as skeptical of perverse government incentives as one can get. But that doesn't mean I automatically take the word of the detainee, either... He has his own incentives at play. He deserves a trial. He didn't deserve to be tortured and shouldn't have been. But his story doesn't add up to me. >>1)sold by kidnappers According to the detainee assessment I linked to above: (Edit: Wikileaks classified Detainee Assessment link: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/af/ISN_01461%2C_Mohammed_Ahmad_Rabbani%27s_Guantanamo_detainee_assessment.pdf https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/af/ISN_0146...) (---Which again, l don't necessarily trust to be true or in good faith any more than the detainees letter, but it's 11 pages of pretty damning classified details, that paint a different picture than "innocent bystander".--- ) >The Pakistani Inter-Service Intelligence Directorate (ISID) captured detainee along with his driver, Muhammad Madni, on 10 September 2002 at detainee’s safe house in Karachi. Detainee was held in Pakistani custody and was transferred to US custody at Bagram, AF in May 2004. Maybe they thought he was someone different, but it looks like he was definitely involved, since: >He [Madni] also provided information on other safe houses, which led on the following day to the arrest of 11 September 2001 terrorist attack planners Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Hassan Muhammad Ali Bin Attash, aka (Muhammed Tawfiq), and other al-Qaida members. During the second ISID raid, a group of eight suspected members of al-Qaida resisted arrest resulting in the deaths of two of the cell members. The remaining six were taken prisoner and weapons and improvised explosive devices (IEDs) were confiscated. >>2) he wasn't the 'driver/messenger/accomplice' of anybody interesting, he was a cab driver with a pregnant wife minding his own business But we don't know that, other than taking him at his word. (Unless you've got something else you're going off of.) The report calls him a combat trained "facilitator" and says he was paid to do many different things, including driving for his superiors, housing militants and smuggling them over the border to Afghanistan: >Detainee is an admitted al-Qaida facilitator, who had the full trust and confidence of al-Qaida leadership. Detainee admitted working directly for senior al-Qaida operational planner Khalid Shaykh Muhammad (KSM)... >In 1994, detainee initially trained for seven months at a militant camp near Khowst, AF and then went to the Khaldan Training Camp for a two-month training session in tactics. Detainee then attempted to go to Kashmir, PK but was arrested at the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, for which he spent 1995 and 1996 in prison. >Detainee has been forthcoming in the past about his role as a facilitator and his associations among the highest levels of the al-Qaida organization, which has been corroborated by numerous JTF-GTMO detainees reporting. ... Detainee downplays the fact that he received advanced military training at terrorist training camps and he has become non-cooperative with interrogators since late 2004. >...Detainee reported meeting with UBL on 6 to 12 occasions... >In 1999, detainee began working directly for UBL’s chief of operations, Abu Hafs,aka (Muhammad Atif). Detainee would transport al-Qaida fighters for Abu Hafs from Karachi to Quetta, PK, where another driver would take them to Kandahar. Detainee next met senior al-Qaida operational planner KU-10024 who offered detainee a job driving him around in a taxi for 200 Pakistani rupees a day. Detainee stated he felt close to KU-10024, believing they fought for the same cause. In 2000, Abu Hafs ordered detainee to rent a house with two floors, one for detainee’s family and one for his guests, but he was frequently away per KU-10024’s instructions to be vigilant. Seriously, there's 11 solid pages of this. Maybe it's lies and a cover-up or maybe not, but at least read and consider that there's more to the story than a prisoner's letter to a paper. If nothing else, read it for insight into the "system" at play.

jacquesm 7y ago

There is no other side: either they arrested him for cause or they did not. Arresting someone thinking they are someone else should automatically result in a release and in this case probably compensation. You are 'just presenting the other side' in the same way that news organizations will pretend to be balanced by presenting two sides of an argument which has already been resolved as though there is some kind of controversy that needs to be kept alive. So, either he was 'a bad guy', let's see the charges, or it was a case of mistaken identity. It does not look like there is much middle ground here.

beerandt 7y ago
1) If the cops get a tip that Bonnie is hiding out in a house, and they raid it only to find Clyde alone, they're going to still arrest him. Even if it takes them time to figure out that Clyde is -in fact- Clyde, and that he isn't Bonnie. Same goes for a senior member of Al Qaeda and his driver/messenger/accomplice. 2) This isn't about his character or being "good" vs "bad". This is about whether he knowingly provided material support to Al Qaeda or enemy combatants. The leaked report I linked to makes a compelling (to me) case that he repeatedly attempted to join and assist militant jihad groups, including after being jailed for it in Pakistan. 3) That said, none of it justifies torture, and none of it justifies denying him the right to a trial, be it military or civilian.
- jacquesm 7y ago
  You apparently did not read the linked article, so let me repeat a couple of salient points: (1) the guy was not arrested in some house after a raid but sold by kidnappers to the Americans being told that he was someone else. (2) he wasn't the 'driver/messenger/accomplice' of anybody interesting, he was a cab driver with a pregnant wife minding his own business Note that because there is no trial that none of the above has ever been countered so that's the only evidence there is. If the other side has a story it wishes to tell it's had 17 years and counting to do so. The only apparent reason why he is still there is because the people in charge are scared that he will sue them (and rightly so). It's a case of perverse incentives gone bad, not a case of catching 'Bonnie' when looking for 'Clyde'.
  - beerandt 7y ago
    >You apparently did not read the linked article Really? C'mon man... The "article" that's a letter written by the detainee? I read it. In detail. I'm saying consider a source other than the detainee. I'm about as skeptical of perverse government incentives as one can get. But that doesn't mean I automatically take the word of the detainee, either... He has his own incentives at play. He deserves a trial. He didn't deserve to be tortured and shouldn't have been. But his story doesn't add up to me. >>1)sold by kidnappers According to the detainee assessment I linked to above: (Edit: Wikileaks classified Detainee Assessment link: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/af/ISN_01461%2C_Mohammed_Ahmad_Rabbani%27s_Guantanamo_detainee_assessment.pdf https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/af/ISN_0146...) (---Which again, l don't necessarily trust to be true or in good faith any more than the detainees letter, but it's 11 pages of pretty damning classified details, that paint a different picture than "innocent bystander".--- ) >The Pakistani Inter-Service Intelligence Directorate (ISID) captured detainee along with his driver, Muhammad Madni, on 10 September 2002 at detainee’s safe house in Karachi. Detainee was held in Pakistani custody and was transferred to US custody at Bagram, AF in May 2004. Maybe they thought he was someone different, but it looks like he was definitely involved, since: >He [Madni] also provided information on other safe houses, which led on the following day to the arrest of 11 September 2001 terrorist attack planners Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Hassan Muhammad Ali Bin Attash, aka (Muhammed Tawfiq), and other al-Qaida members. During the second ISID raid, a group of eight suspected members of al-Qaida resisted arrest resulting in the deaths of two of the cell members. The remaining six were taken prisoner and weapons and improvised explosive devices (IEDs) were confiscated. >>2) he wasn't the 'driver/messenger/accomplice' of anybody interesting, he was a cab driver with a pregnant wife minding his own business But we don't know that, other than taking him at his word. (Unless you've got something else you're going off of.) The report calls him a combat trained "facilitator" and says he was paid to do many different things, including driving for his superiors, housing militants and smuggling them over the border to Afghanistan: >Detainee is an admitted al-Qaida facilitator, who had the full trust and confidence of al-Qaida leadership. Detainee admitted working directly for senior al-Qaida operational planner Khalid Shaykh Muhammad (KSM)... >In 1994, detainee initially trained for seven months at a militant camp near Khowst, AF and then went to the Khaldan Training Camp for a two-month training session in tactics. Detainee then attempted to go to Kashmir, PK but was arrested at the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, for which he spent 1995 and 1996 in prison. >Detainee has been forthcoming in the past about his role as a facilitator and his associations among the highest levels of the al-Qaida organization, which has been corroborated by numerous JTF-GTMO detainees reporting. ... Detainee downplays the fact that he received advanced military training at terrorist training camps and he has become non-cooperative with interrogators since late 2004. >...Detainee reported meeting with UBL on 6 to 12 occasions... >In 1999, detainee began working directly for UBL’s chief of operations, Abu Hafs,aka (Muhammad Atif). Detainee would transport al-Qaida fighters for Abu Hafs from Karachi to Quetta, PK, where another driver would take them to Kandahar. Detainee next met senior al-Qaida operational planner KU-10024 who offered detainee a job driving him around in a taxi for 200 Pakistani rupees a day. Detainee stated he felt close to KU-10024, believing they fought for the same cause. In 2000, Abu Hafs ordered detainee to rent a house with two floors, one for detainee’s family and one for his guests, but he was frequently away per KU-10024’s instructions to be vigilant. Seriously, there's 11 solid pages of this. Maybe it's lies and a cover-up or maybe not, but at least read and consider that there's more to the story than a prisoner's letter to a paper. If nothing else, read it for insight into the "system" at play.