What lies ahead for Binyam Mohamed?
As the Guantanamo detainee returns to Britain, Richard Osley looks at the uncertainties he faces in adjusting to normal life after years of imprisonment
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Binyam Mohamed's hunger strike at Guantanamo sharpened focus on his claims of mistreatment at the hands of US authorities
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He will no longer have to wear the orange jumpsuit that has been his garb for the past four and a half years. It is just one small adjustment among the myriad changes that Binyam Mohamed will cope with as he leaves incarceration in Cuba for a future of fear and uncertainty.
The former Guantanamo Bay prisoner is due to fly into RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire tomorrow. Instead of being raced to an interrogation by anti-terrorism officers, he will almost certainly to be taken to hospital. At some stage, the 30-year-old will answer questions, but there is little prospect of any charges being brought. This week, his medical condition will be the chief priority.
Recently described as “just skin and bones”, Mr Mohamed has been left looking emaciated after a five-week hunger strike. A doctor will sit next to him throughout the flight home. He has paid a heavy price for his freedom: it was refusing food that sharpened the focus on his claims of torture at the hands of US authorities, the conditions at Guantanamo and his lack of opportunity for a legal appeal. Any “evidence” of links with terrorist groups, he said, was forced out of him in a “dark prison” in Kabul and a torture chamber in Morocco before he was sent to the prison camp in Cuba.
His release was confirmed by the Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, on Friday night.
By late tomorrow or early Tuesday, Mr Mohamed is likely to be free for the first time since he was arrested at Karachi airport in 2002, while allegedly using a false passport. Although born in Ethiopia, he was given leave to stay in the UK in 1994 as a teenage asylum-seeker. His travels to Pakistan and Afghanistan – explained by him as an attempt to get away from a bad circle of friends in London – led to US suspicions that he had been involved in al-Qa’ida training camps and a “dirty bomb” plot to attack America. Mr Mohamed denies the claims, and says he was abused during his detention: the alleged torture included cutting his penis with a scalpel and hanging him in the air by a leather strap.
He is reluctant to go to hospital. He will need psychiatric help to readjust to a world without eye masks, barbed wire, handcuffs and armed guards. Lord Carlile, the Lib Dem peer who has led an independent review of the UK’s terror laws, said yesterday: “I would expect a light and gentle touch to be applied to ensure that he is given every opportunity, subject to law, to integrate himself back into British society. There is no doubt he has suffered.”
Mr Mohamed will follow in the footsteps of eight other British residents who have been released from Guantanamo. Moazzam Begg, a bookseller from Birmingham who spent nearly three years in the camp without ever being charged, wrote a book about his harrowing experiences. But he is exceptional in his resilience against the mental scars inflicted in the prison.
Other former inmates have looked to blend quietly back into everyday life. “There is no rehabilitation programme, nothing as far as the Government is concerned, which helps to reintroduce this person into normal society,” Mr Begg told a radio interviewer. “In the case of somebody who returns to this country where he has no family members, it’s going to be doubly difficult.”
Mr Mohamed is said to want to get to “somewhere quiet”. It is unclear where he will stay, and there could be legal action over his right to stay in the country. He has no family here: his brother and sister live in the US. And he has a lost touch with many of the friends he made while studying.
Kate Allen, from Amnesty International, said last night: “The immediate focus should now be on providing medical and other support for Binyam.”
Mr Mohamed’s lawyer, Clive Stafford Smith, said: “He wants to go somewhere extremely quiet and have nothing to do with anyone. Binyam wants nothing more than to return to normal life in Britain.”
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Comments
I understand it's quiet lovely there at this time of the year.
There he would be amongst friends and fresh mountain air. After a few months there we could bring him back. He would be the decent thing to do.
England is nothing, if not a historical melting pot of different cultures and customs. If you don't like it, I suggest you find yourself a tiny island where you can govern yourself, protect yourself, tax yourself, serve and heal yourself, and exclude anyone who doesn't look, act or think like you.
We'll see you back here the day after tomorrow.
This Guy was an illegal immigrant and his was only granted residency because of length of stay, he then decided to move to Afghanistan, apparently to get away from is drugs problem to an area which produces the most heroin in the world and the only to arrested on a false passport and then try's to blame the UK government to he can get some compo. I say why do we need people like this in this country.
I am not aware of how diversity and unity are polar opposites, nor indeed how it has only been over the 'last 40 years' that there have been 'large numbers of different cultures in this country'. I will not expend unnecessary energy here save to suggest you take an in-depth study of our history and perhaps even find out where the major arrivals in the last 40 years came from, and why.
What is perhaps most perplexing is that people with this sort of cultural myopia assume they know where 'open borders' people are coming from. They assume that because I believe we should have an open borders policy, I somehow condone the tip-toeing political correctness of our time. How stunted. And then to assume that I am a Labour voter is the final nail in the coffin. (Not mine, I should add.)
Of course, that such arguments are something of an embarrassment to public debate is only my opinion, and hence again I must refute the idea I would seek to 'silence any voice that doesn't agree with you own idea of multi-culturalism'. Debate, dear widester, is part of any strong democracy and public discourse. As the saying goes, I may disagree with what you say, but I will fight to the death to defend your right to say it. (I do wish you'd use it slightly more wisely, though.)
Focusing on the wider issue rather than the calibre of response, however, it always appalls me how these neanderthal views are propagated by those who cite the changing name of Christmas lights (distasteful though I may find this) as a cultural armageddon. Perhaps the phrasology we now use to refer to black people, gay people, disabled people and the like would have been better before the advent of some discussion about how language reinforces prejudice.
Furthermore, as American sociologist Frank Tannenbaum says, 'The United States has as much crimes as it generates' and goes on to explain how the alleged 'criminals' in society are as much a part of the wider social complex as its poets, philosophers, artisans and engineers. In a global community, and not least one in which we are happy to disturb the international peace for a range of justified and unjustified reasons, how can we not expect the same principle to apply? Can we be surprised if we destroy Iraq's infrastructure and find an influx of Iraqi refugees? Can we be surprised if we bomb Afghanistan and find again, the lines at immigration? Can we be surprised if we subsidize African farmers out of agricultural markets and discover they have instead come to our shores to seek a better life? Can we be surprised if we enforce sanctions on Zimbabwe and discover that this has had no effect whatsoever on the government, but only enriched its propaganda efforts?
I am not saying for a moment that these actions are in themselves just or unjust. Each one must be judged on its own merit. But as global participants, and a country - like most others - built on an undeniable multi-culturalism, a richness of traditions, an ability to evolve - it is nothing less than bigotry and nothing more than tribalism to espouse views which fail to engage in even a percentile of the issues at stake.
Needless to say, I look forward to your response.
In addition and as far as I can recall, this young man left the UK on his own free will to return to Kashmir but was arrested in Pakistan with false papers. So why do people keep insisting he is a British resident. He should be returned to his country of origin and not here.
Time to wake up England
What is needed is for every taxpayer to refuse to fund the nonsense this government dishes out and anything future governments try.
The quicker we send people like Mohamed and Kate Allen back to the hills of Ethopia the better for all of us.
Why dont you clowns all go and live in paki land too, by the way i hate nazi's & skinheads & racists, but i also hate illegal immigrants who are breaking the back of this once great country.
These corrupt little people, come from there corrupt little countries to the UK, never do a days work here, get a council house with in a week, it would take a UK national about 8 years, they get cars from the benefit office & there on invalid benefit for there entire stay with us.
Get out from your mansion you prat & get mugged by one of them & maybe you might not be so concerned about spelling.
Oh the spelling police, is that your contribution in life? you ASS.............
ROFL!!
he will spend most of time chillng down the mosque and doing a bit of holiday around the world.
i will bet my whole mortgage on this outcome. well done kate and Clive !!>
Binyam Mohamed (great British name) is no British citizen and never has been. The fact that NuLabours lieing immigration minister allowed this man to reside here at one point is no reason for allowing him to do so again.
Does this fool government actually believe that after spending several years in Guantanamo, this Binyam Mohamed (great British name) is just going to settle down and tend to his roses?
Binyam Mohamed (great British name) is probably bitter, angry, hateful of the West and is bound to be more trouble. He will come to Britain and be welcomed as a hero by the headbanging, hate filled Islamist and the hot, eyebrow twitching Asian babes in their burkas.
On his return he should be put straight on the first outward bound bucket seat flight available along with the rest of his none British citizen family.
Britain already has a perfectly adequate group destroying the country, it's called NuLabour.
But what do facts matter to the UKIP blackshirts?
Hadn't you better get back to sucking yankee shoeleather?
Maybe you should start thinking about going home.
If you think it's a barrel of laughs blowing up buses and tube trains then welcome him with open arms.
Bottom line is would not Mohamed feel more at home amongst others like himself in his homeland Ethopia, and should not he be sent there by the US as they are holding him not the UK?
Clive
All of this happened and what did YOU do? Maybe you campaigned, wrote a letter or two, something of little inconvenience to you that has little or no efficacy other than to lend you an undue sense of self-worth and smugness. These are our brothers and sisters and you did NOTHING. So this individual AFTER being locked up for 4 years without trial (with or without torture, that is still bad enough) is being bought back to this country. So what? You think that excluding these people after imprisoning them without charge would impress and placate the Muslim community in the UK more? Plus, your opinions on Muslims are so far wide of the mark, ignorant and offensive, it is obvious that you are all well-to-do with little or no interaction with the society you purport to know so much about. At least you must do to be able to cast such ill-informed, damming indictments with such abandon.
What is most insulting of all is that despite the background to this situation being deaths of Brits and Afghans - in fact; Americans, Iraqis and all sorts - to suit the agendas of the conglomerates and the most influential western autocracies.... You are all complaining about penny pinching and the cost to the tax payer.
So, straight faced, when eye-to-eye with blatant and cynical invasion and killing with horrible and pointless loss on both sides, you can ignore the bigger picture and complain about some of the resulting refugees from the situation YOU FAILED TO AVERT stealing your tax money, jobs and women. Do you ever look at yourselves in the mirror? Do you ever stop to think, or have your minds been so rotted by staring at TV screens you are incapable of self-examination and critique?
If you can sleep at night whilst boiling down the subjugation of a swathe of religious society to disapproving of the results on financial grounds, then obviously - little doggy - you've been sitting up and paying attention to the right adverts. I'm sure you're having a good nightol!
One thing is guaranteed, NuLabour will be in meltdown at the next general election and hopefully, the new government will hold them accountable for their crimes. All of them.
As for the concerns for Muslim sensitivities, I have none. I care not one jot for the Muslim community. I am sick to death of hearing the poor trodden on Muslim community bleating about this offending them, that offending them.
Look, this is an English speaking Christian society, based on Christian values & principles, free speech and democracy. It is not for us to change our traditions in order to fit in with foreigners sensibilities, culture or religion. We are not going to adapt to fit in with your culture. If you want to live here you must adapt to fit in with ours. If the Muslim community cannot fit-in with Western society, it has no place in Western society.
You are free to leave.
Another great Christian value. The freedom to leave.
Personally, I think this is all based on trust. Myself, I trust my brother man over ANY form of press or government. People just want to be and exist. Government and press have things to gain from twisting stories far beyond anything a single human could. Therefore, I trust ANY muslim, Sikh, well damn anything - Satanist even - more than any newspaper or Politician. You probably do too. Just don't turn so inward through your despair that you recycle thoughts and emotions without examining them. It's dangerous, and often you end up saying and doing things you never really meant!
All Nu Labour govt ministers, from 1997 onwards, should be held accountable for their appalling actions against the increasingly hard-working citizens of the UK.
The UK Christian society has to stand up against this govt as well as Muslim communities who are consistently attempting to alter the British way of life and erode what we have striven for during the last century.
Dear Muslims, if you do not like our way of life, I respectfully suggest you leave and live in a country that would better suit your needs.
All of you are frankly DISGUSTING individuals.
We are not disgusting individuals. We are British people, sick and tired of welcoming citizens of other countries to our country and who then seek to destroy our culture, our values and our freedom of speech. Binyam Mohamed is not British, he is Ethiopian. We do not owe any allegiance to him nor him to us. He has no family in the UK. Talking of which, why did he come here in the first place then sally forth to Pakistan and Afghanistan of all places in the world he could go to? I see his explanation was to get away from friends in London. So he didn't like London therefore why is he coming back to London? He will no doubt live there at the taxpayers expense and this is unacceptable. The UK govt has to wake up and start listening to its electorate. We no longer want to accommodate radicals of any persuasion whose sole purpose is to destroy all that is British.
I maintain the fact that allowing your government to illegally hold foreign nationals for protracted amounts of time then complaining about the cost to the tax-payer is disgusting!
The fundamental difference, it is my choice.
It is not and never has been the remit of government to assume that every one who wants to come here is given entry and that living here is automatically funded by the taxpayer.
We are supposed to be a democracy, you know the concept of majority.
Given the State of our economy and the level of National debt, created by Browns policies, the people should have a say and it appears the majority have a great deal more sense than this cabal and a handful of bleeding hearts.
He was not Imprisoned by the UK government at all. Get your facts straight.
Your Ideas of an open borders system is just frankly un thought out and idiotic, systems like that just cause more problems, like housing, travel infrastructure and education. I'm sure that you would change your mind if you had cancer and the NHS couldn't fund your treatment because the NHS is over stretched to pay for treatment immigrants with TB, Aids cancer and other health problems . You are not realistic and live a dream world utopia. What about if your kids could get a place at school because of Immigrants and the social system giving them higher priority like it does now.
Mass low paid immigration doesn't help the economy as it drives down wages for the indigenous population and the tax revenue is low so that it doesn't cover the services the UK provide. IF you want Mass immigration there are consequences and poor public service's is one, just look at Slough council as an example.
I would like to live on a beach in the Maldives perhaps they could give me a nice beach hut and pay me benefits, but no doubt if 1000000 brits pushed out the locals you would say that is unfair and should be stopped.
Actually you are. Gutless spineless little tossers, who want to play soldiers and have big wars, but hate to lose them (as you have) or deal with the consquences of your torture, murder and lies.
You really make me PUKE.
And I'm born in London, before you start your pathetic castrated squealing, GUTLESS A*SEHOLE.
The people who are avading the facts about the "outrage", I assume, they are the remenants of the same tribe of coverds, the"outrage".
If Ben has no place to go or nobody to see I am happy to provide him an accomodation and to offer him a friendship. That is the least a country who has had a hand in renditions and torture, could do for a victim of torture. We should hide our faces from the shame of what our government has been a party to the vile act of torture. People coming here and discussing immigration is a shameless and audacious jesture from a coverd.
Tizab.
The people who are avading the facts about the "outrage", I assume, they are the remenants of the same tribe of cowards, the"outrage".
If Ben has no place to go or nobody to see I am happy to provide him an accomodation and to offer him a friendship. That is the least a country who has had a hand in renditions and torture, could do for a victim of torture. We should hide our faces from the shame of what our government has been a party to the vile act of torture. People coming here and discussing immigration is a shameless and audacious jesture from a coward.
Tizab.
The people who are avading the facts about the "outrage", I assume, they are the remenants of the same tribe of cowards, the"outrage".
If Ben has no place to go or nobody to see I am happy to provide him an accomodation and to offer him a friendship. That is the least a country who has had a hand in renditions and torture, could do for a victim of torture. We should hide our faces from the shame of what our government has been a party to the vile act of torture. People coming here and discussing immigration is a shameless and audacious jesture from a coward.
Tizab.
If he'd stuck to getting on with life in London instead of "holidaying" in a war zone...well, the rest is non-history.
Are you reluctant to say unpalatable things about the people who do outragious things?
Are there really this many few numbers of people in the UK who truly understand the true meaning of having a principled justice system and processes,and the consequeces of a lack of such system on having a demacacy today?
"In a confusion, are we leading eachother arround down a worrying spiral of ignorance"?
He should not have been here in the first place.
All you human rights idiots need to get in the real world.
You need to ask yourself what he was doing in Afghansitan, was there a conference of the ethiopian brass rubbing society being held in Kabul ?
You will all look a tad foolish if this man decides to continue to pursue his blatant hatred of the hand that has fed him by exploding a few of his home made meccano bombs .
was he not caught in terrorist training camp.
The poor little angel was just there to kick his drug habit .
By learning to make bombs and shoot british soldiers
Guantanamo apparently does not know. It appears some deal has been done between the US and UK.
This for a person who has very doubtful qualifications to remain in the UK. the torture allegations are a redherring as far as this is concerned - disturbing though the reports are.
He is, of course, already on substantial state benefits. Why was such expensive transport used to bring him back?
I think we should be told these things.