Said Muhammad Husayn Qahtani

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For other uses, see Mohammed Said.
Said Muhammad Husayn Qahtani
Citizenship Saudi

Said Muhammad Husayn Qahtani is a citizen of Saudi Arabia, held in extrajudicial detention in the United States Guantanamo Bay detainment camps, in Cuba.[1]

The Department of Defense estimate he was born in 1978, in Khamees Mushail, Saudi Arabia.

Said Muhammad Husayn Qahtani arrived at Guantanamo on February 15, 2002, and has been held there for Template:For year month day.[2][3][4]

Background

Said al Qahtani was law student who acknowledged making three trips to Afghanistan - Pakistan region in 2000 and 2001. He acknowledged receiving some military training in the region -- but explained that, according to the religious traditions in which he was raised, all observant muslims should make sure they had enough training that they would be able to defend themselves. He acknowledged that, on his final visit, he was aware of fatwas, authorizing observant muslims participating in hostilities in Afghanistan. However, he disputed he should be considered a fighter, even though he had been issued a rifle, and had stood guard duty, as he only ever fired the rifle in training.

He acknowledged the quarters he had been assigned was the target of an aerial bombardment, following which Afghans fled west, and Arabs like himself fled east, to nearby Pakistan.

He described seeking out Pakistani officials after crossing the Pakistan border, and requesting they arrange for a meeting with Saudi diplomats who he thought would help him return to Saudi Arabia.

Said al Qahtani was cleared for release following his 2008 annual status review.

Official status reviews

Originally the Bush Presidency asserted captives apprehended in its "war on terror" were not protected by the Geneva Conventions, and could be help indefinitely without providing any explanation. However, in 2004, in Rasul v. Bush, the United States Supreme Court ruled that the captives had to be informed of the allegations that justified their detention, and had to be given an opportunity to try to refute those allegations.

Office for the Administrative Review of Detained Enemy Combatants

Following the Supreme Court's ruling in Rasul v. Bush the Department of Defense set up the Office for the Administrative Review of Detained Enemy Combatants, which conducted nominally annual public reviews.

Scholars at the Brookings Institute, lead by Benjamin Wittes, listed the captives still held in Guantanamo in December 2008, according to whether their detention was justified by certain common allegations[5]:

  • Said Muhammad Husayn Qahtani was listed as one of the captives who "The military alleges ... are associated with both Al Qaeda and the Taliban."[5]
  • Said Muhammad Husayn Qahtani was listed as one of the captives who "The military alleges ... traveled to Afghanistan for jihad."[5]
  • Said Muhammad Husayn Qahtani was listed as one of the captives who "The military alleges ... stayed in Al Qaeda, Taliban or other guest- or safehouses."[5]
  • Said Muhammad Husayn Qahtani was listed as one of the captives who "The military alleges ... took military or terrorist training in Afghanistan."[5]
  • Said Muhammad Husayn Qahtani was listed as one of the captives who "The military alleges ... fought for the Taliban."[5]
  • Said Muhammad Husayn Qahtani was listed as one of the captives who "The military alleges ... were at Tora Bora."[5]
  • Said Muhammad Husayn Qahtani was listed as one of the captives whose "names or aliases were found on material seized in raids on Al Qaeda safehouses and facilities."[5]
  • Said Muhammad Husayn Qahtani was listed as one of the captives who was an "al Qaeda operative".[5]
  • Said Muhammad Husayn Qahtani was listed as one of "36 [captives who] openly admit either membership or significant association with Al Qaeda, the Taliban, or some other group the government considers militarily hostile to the United States."[5]
  • Said Muhammad Husayn Qahtani was listed as one of the captives who had admitted "fighting on behalf of Al Qaeda or the Taliban."[5]

Formerly secret Joint Task Force Guantanamo assessment

On April 25, 2011, whistleblower organization WikiLeaks published formerly secret assessments drafted by Joint Task Force Guantanamo analysts.[6][7][8]

Habeas corpus petition

Saad Al Qahtani was one of five Saudi who had a petition of habeas corpus filed on their behalf December 13, 2005, in Salam Abdullah Said v. George W. Bush.[9][10]

Cleared for release

Documents from 97 captives 2008 Administrative Review Board hearings were published on July 10, 2012. Those documents show that seven captives were cleared for release, and that just three captives attended their hearings. Said al Qahtani both attended his hearing, and had his board recommend his release.

One of the questions the Presiding Officer asked him was:

In factors favoring release you said you've never been a member of al Qaida and does not even know if you've ever fought with al Qaida member. How can you explain that your name was on a list of al Qaida Mujahedin, the list indicated that your passport, credit card and discharge information were held in an al Qaida account?

Said was able to reply that he had recently been told the name on the computer file -- "Kalid Mufleh al Qahtan" -- not his name at all. Further, he couldn't explain anything about "discharge information" as he didn't know what that was.

References

  1. ↑ OARDEC. "List of Individuals Detained by the Department of Defense at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba from January 2002 through May 15, 2006". United States Department of Defense. http://www.dod.mil/news/May2006/d20060515%20List.pdf. Retrieved 2006-05-15. 
  2. ↑ JTF-GTMO (2007-03-16). "Measurements of Heights and Weights of Individuals Detained by the Department of Defense at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba". Department of Defense. http://www.dod.mil/pubs/foi/detainees/measurements/. Retrieved 2008-12-22.  mirror
  3. ↑ "Measurements of Heights and Weights of Individuals Detained by the Department of Defense at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba (ordered and consolidated version)". Center for the Study of Human Rights in the Americas, from DoD data. Archived from the original on 2009-12-21. http://www.webcitation.org/query?url=http%3A%2F%2Fhumanrights.ucdavis.edu%2Fresources%2Flibrary%2Fdocuments-and-reports%2Fgtmo_heightsweights.pdf&date=2009-12-21. 
  4. ↑ Margot Williams (2008-11-03). "Guantanamo Docket: Said Muhammad Husyan Qahtani". New York Times. http://projects.nytimes.com/guantanamo/detainees/200-said-muhammad-husyan-qahtani. Retrieved 2012-07-17. 
  5. ↑ 5.00 5.01 5.02 5.03 5.04 5.05 5.06 5.07 5.08 5.09 5.10 Benjamin Wittes, Zaathira Wyne (2008-12-16). "The Current Detainee Population of Guantánamo: An Empirical Study". The Brookings Institute. http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/research/files/reports/2008/12/16%20detainees%20wittes/1216_detainees_wittes.pdf. Retrieved 2010-02-16. "Al Sani said he traveled to Afghanistan shortly before September 11 and trained on a Kalashnikov. “I felt it was important in coming of age,” he said. “I went to Afghanistan for weapons training, not to fight anyone.”"  mirror
  6. ↑ Christopher Hope, Robert Winnett, Holly Watt, Heidi Blake (2011-04-27). "WikiLeaks: Guantanamo Bay terrorist secrets revealed -- Guantanamo Bay has been used to incarcerate dozens of terrorists who have admitted plotting terrifying attacks against the West – while imprisoning more than 150 totally innocent people, top-secret files disclose". The Telegraph (UK). Archived from the original on 2012-07-13. http://www.webcitation.org/query?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.telegraph.co.uk%2Fnews%2Fworldnews%2Fwikileaks%2F8471907%2FWikiLeaks-Guantanamo-Bay-terrorist-secrets-revealed.html&date=2012-07-13. Retrieved 2012-07-13. "The Daily Telegraph, along with other newspapers including The Washington Post, today exposes America’s own analysis of almost ten years of controversial interrogations on the world’s most dangerous terrorists. This newspaper has been shown thousands of pages of top-secret files obtained by the WikiLeaks website." 
  7. ↑ "WikiLeaks: The Guantánamo files database". The Telegraph (UK). 2011-04-27. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wikileaks-files/guantanamo-bay-wikileaks-files/8476672/WikiLeaks-The-Guantanamo-files-database.html. Retrieved 2012-07-10. 
  8. ↑ "Guantanamo Bay detainee file on Sad Muhammad Husayn Al Muflih Al Qahtani, US9SA-000200DP, passed to the Telegraph by Wikileaks". The Telegraph (UK). 2011-04-27. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wikileaks-files/guantanamo-bay-wikileaks-files/8477301/Guantanamo-Bay-detainee-file-on-Sad-Muhammad-Husayn-Al-Muflih-Al-Qahtani-US9SA-000200DP.html. Retrieved 2012-07-17. 
  9. ↑ "Respondents' response to Court's August 7, 2006 order". United States Department of Defense. August 15, 2006. Archived from the original on 2008-06-27. http://web.archive.org/web/20080627111630/http://www.pegc.us/archive/OK_v_Bush/govt_resp_to_GK_20060815.pdf. Retrieved 2008-06-23.  mirror
  10. ↑ "Guantanamo Bay Detainee Litigation: Doc 139 -- Civil Action No. 05-CV-2384 (RWR) STATUS REPORT REGARDING SAID V. BUSH". United States Department of Justice. 2008-07-18. http://docs.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/district-of-columbia/dcdce/1:2008mc00442/131990/139/0.pdf. Retrieved 2008-08-18. 

External links

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