Hundreds of secret documents containing individual assessments of Guantanamo Bay detainees, were revealed Monday morning
The documents were supplied to whistleblower site WikiLeaks, and many are now featured on the site. They were also obtained by the New York Times, NPR and several other news outlets, either through WikiLeaks themselves or via anonymous third parties.
The assessments outline each of the detainee’s backgrounds and, in some instances, the evidence gathered against them, which appears to range from the solid to the flimsy.
“Most of these documents reveal accounts of incompetence familiar to those who have studied Guantánamo closely, with innocent men detained by mistake … or because the US was offering substantial bounties to its allies for al-Qaeda or Taliban suspects,” a statement from WikiLeaks reads.
Several cases that have been widely reported include:
- An Afghan shepherd who was detained for three years after being found close to the scene of an explosion, despite an assessment that determined he posed little risk.
-Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, an Afghan who ran a military training camp that was ultimately closed after he refused to offer services to al Qaeda.
-Abd al-Hakim Bukhari, a Saudi initially detained by al Qaeda as a spy, then freed by U.S. forces following the invasion of Afghanistan and then sent to the Guantanamo detention facility.
-Sami al-Hajj, a Sudanese-born camera operator for the television al Jazeera, who was detained for six years after being accused of helping terrorists smuggle money and weapons. The documents reveal that he was also questioned over al-Jazeera’s “newsgathering operations in Chechnya, Kosovo and Afghanistan.”
The Obama administration has condemned the release of the documents and Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell issued a statement chastising news organizations for distributing the documents.
President Obama promised to close the controversial detention facility and transfer its detainees in both his campaign and the early days of his presidency. The facility remains open.
The first batch of documents can be read here.