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The following was excerpted from The Salon article Guantanamo prisoner’s tragic letter: Adnan Latif suffered at the hands of the U.S. government in ways that most people can't begin to comprehend
Adnan Latif was found dead in his cell on September 10, 2012, just a day before the eleventh anniversary of 9/11. He was 32. Latif, a Yemeni citizen, had been detained at Guantanamo Bay for over a decade, despite a 2010 court ruling that ordered the Obama administration to “take all necessary and appropriate diplomatic steps to facilitate Latif’s release forthwith,” due to lack of evidence that he had committed any crime.
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A car accident in 1994 left Latif with a head injury, which he was attempting to get treated in Afghanistan when he was captured near the border by Pakistani authorities. In January, 2002, he was sent to Guantanamo, with the unfortunate distinction of being one of the first detainees. According to the ACLU, Latif was cleared to be released in 2004, 2007, 2009, and again in 2010 by US District Court Judge Henry Kennedy. The Obama DOJ appealed the 2010 decision, in part because of a policy of not transferring detainees to Yemen, and so Latif remained in custody – not because of what he had done (which was nothing), but because of where he was born. The decision to appeal his release wasn’t a holdover from the Bush era. That was an affirmative decision made by the Obama administration, and any supporters who hoped Obama would close Guantanamo Bay should understand that fact.
Latif is far from the only prisoner still held at Guantanamo despite being okayed for release. “Over half of the people left in Gitmo have been cleared for years,” said Cori Crider, Legal Director at Reprieve in charge of managing litigation on secret prisons, who has represented clients detained at Guantanamo. Crider went on to say that although conditions at the prison are better than they were in 2002, indefinite detention is enough to break people. “That young man, who was, say, twenty when he is seized, is thirty. He sees his life slipping away from him with no sign of release. Hopelessness takes lives at Gitmo now.”
Further Reading
Omar Khadr, Oh Canada
Edited by Janice Williamson
In Omar Khadr, Oh Canada, over thirty contributors analyze Khadr's background, his incarceration, the actions of Canadian authorities, and the implications raised by his legal case. This multi-genre book includes essays, articles, poems, a play, extended excerpts from the documentary film You Don't Like the Truth, and other texts produced by distinguished contributors such as Sherene Razack, General Roméo Dallaire, Charles Foran, Kim Echlin, Judith Thompson, Audrey Macklin, Shadia Drury, George Elliott Clarke, Maher Arar, Rick Salutin, and Sheema Khan. While they sometimes disagree on issues such as radical Islam and Canadian multiculturalism, they all write from the conviction that Khadr's treatment has been – and continues to be – shamefully unjust and shaped by post 9/11 Islamophobia that continues to distort the views of many Canadians.
To learn more about Omar Khadr, Oh Canada or to order online, click here.
For media inquiries, contact MQUP Publicist Jacqui Davis.
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