From: Biniam Haile \(SWE\) (eritrea.lave@comhem.se)
Date: Thu Oct 23 2008 - 15:53:57 EDT
French Daily Says CIA Runs "African Guantanamo" in Ethiopia, Somalia
Source: BBC Monitoring European
Pub. Date: Oct 23 2008 6:38 AM
Text of report by French centre-left daily newspaper Liberation website
on 23 October
[OSC Translated Text] [Report by Stephanie Braquehais: "Survivors of the
African Guantanamo"]
On willow rugs directed towards the east, the men finish the Friday
prayer in the village of Bongwe, 30 km south of the Kenyan port of
Mombasa. This day the Muslim Human Rights Forum is organizing a meeting
to denounce the illegal deportations to Somalia and Ethiopia of more
than 150 people of various nationalities, including Kenyans, in the name
of the fight against terrorism.
The village has gathered to listen to the tale of eight Kenyans,
released in early October after more than a year in secret jails in
Ethiopia. Accused of ties with Al-Qa'idah, they did not have access to
either a lawyer or their family. Secretly, Salim Awadh Salim, 46, in a
white boubou and keffiyeh, talks.
This businessman had a mobile phone store in Mombasa when he decided to
invest in Mogadishu, during the brief reign of the Islamic courts. The
intervention of the Ethiopian Army in December 2006 forced him to flee
and return to Kenya. "There were several of us who tried to cross over
from the other side," he recounts. "We succeeded in getting to Kiunga
(editor's note: the Kenyan border village with Somalia). No boat wanted
to carry us if we did not have the authorization of the Kenyan police,
because the government had closed the border. When we presented
ourselves to the authorities, our identity cards were taken and we were
questioned at the police station."
This version contradicts that of the Kenyan authorities, who say these
men maintained they had Somali nationality. After spending several days
imprisoned in Kiunga, they were secretly transferred to Nairobi. Then,
at the end of January they were transported by civilian plane to
Mogadishu and to Baidoa, in Somalia, then by military plane to Ethiopia.
"There were some 10 of us in a small room, our hands tied behind our
backs, our feet bound and our eyes covered. The women and children were
in a different room. We could only go out for 10 minutes three times a
day for meals. The Ethiopian soldiers sometimes hit us or mistreated us.
Very quickly the interrogations began. I was awakened in the middle of
the night, put in a small room, and several hours later taken to a large
room where (American) agents of the CIA were located.
"They constantly repeated to me: "We have proof you have worked for Bin
Ladin."" At the time of his arrest, Salim Awadh had in fact been in the
company of Halima Badroudine Hussein, the wife of Comorian Abdullah
Mohamed Fazul, considered the mastermind of the attacks on the American
embassies of Nairobi and Dar es Salaam (Tanzania) that caused hundreds
of deaths in August 1998. Salim Awadh maintains he had never met this
woman nor her husband before. "The interrogations lasted the entire day,
and I was forced to admit that I was a member of Al-Qa'idah. "If you do
not confess this will be just the start of your suffering," they told
me."
Mistreatment
Several human rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch,
established contact with the prisoners. Ethiopian soldiers, sympathetic,
sometimes left them cell phones hidden under the mattress. "I know that
one soldier was sentenced to two years in prison because he had tried to
help us," Salim Awadh continues. The accusations of mistreatment,
relayed by international organizations that describe these prisons as an
"African Guantanamo," have been denied by Addis Ababa. "All these people
were on the side of the Islamic courts and were captured in Somalia,"
Ethiopia's Minister of Information Berhan Hailu maintained in early
October.
The Kenyan Government has not yet decided on their fate. "Investigations
have revealed that these Kenyans left for Somalia to undergo military
training and were recruited by terrorist cells acting in southern
Somalia," government spokesperson Alfred Mutua states.
Originally published by Liberation website, Paris, in French 23 Oct 08.
http://www.iqpc.com/News.aspx?id=122598124
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