After 10 Years in Guantanamo, Aamer to His Captors: Please Torture Me in the Old Way
On the day he marks 10 years locked inside the world's most notorious prison without having been charged with an offence, the last UK resident in Guantanamo Bay pleads with his US captors: "Please torture me in the old way ... Here they destroy people mentally and physically without leaving marks."
Speaking from his cell through letters and comments published for the first time in "The Independent" British daily Monday, Shaker Aamer, who has never stood trial, reveals the torment of his captivity and removal from his family.
According to the paper, "fears are growing for the welfare of Aamer, from south London, who is now 45 and has a wife and four children. He has never met his youngest son."
His lawyers are particularly concerned by the deterioration of his mental and physical state, which Aamer describes vividly in his letters.
He has lost 40 per cent of his body weight and is suffering from health problems, aggravated by long periods in solitary confinement.
"The Independent" has seen dozens of handwritten letters from Aamer to his wife and family and published a selection of extracts.
Heavily censored and containing scrawled drawings to entertain his children, they paint a portrait of his time in Guantanamo.
On 19 August 2002, he writes: "You won't believe me; my hand is killing me from writing and also my back. I am getting old. I just became 41... but physically I'm 50. I got arthritis, kidney problems, hearing problems, eye problems, my hair has fallen, my heart is aching."
On 9 August 2008, he says: "My sweetheart, yes I lost a lot of weight, yes I have a lot of sickness, yes I got short sight, yes my bones are aching, yes I got white hair, yes I got old, but ... my heart is still young, my mind still strong, stronger than ever."
One of his lawyers, Cori Crider, who visited Aamer in Guantanamo last week, said: "Shaker has dropped to perhaps 150lb 68kg, his face bears the marks of suffering, and while he has a nigh-irrepressible spirit, the authorities seem determined to grind him down to nothing.
Moreover, Clive Stafford Smith, another of his lawyers, said his client had been reading 1984 by George Orwell.
"You must read this book because you need to understand what is happening here in Guantanamo," Aamer told him during a visit late last year, the notes of which were declassified two days ago.
Captured in Afghanistan in December 2001 and held in Kandahar and Bagram before being transferred to Guantanamo Bay on 13 February 2002, Aamer unveiled that he has been tortured over a number of years. He further explains that "he was tortured in the presence of a British MI6 officer in Afghanistan."
According to Smith, Aamer began his latest spell in isolation on 15 July last year.
A British resident, born in Saudi Arabia, Aamer had indefinite leave to remain in the UK when he was reportedly sold to the US in 2001 by Afghan villagers for $5,000.
Source: Independent, Edited by moqawama.org
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