Government admits filming torture of Gitmo inmate, alleged 9/11 plotter

By Stephen C. Webster
Monday, October 5th, 2009 -- 3:38 pm
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mohammedalqahtani Government admits filming torture of Gitmo inmate, alleged 9/11 plotterThe United States government admitted on Monday that the torture of a Saudi man alleged to be part of the 9/11 plot was recorded on video, according to court documents procured by the Center for Constitutional Rights.

The tapes, allegedly showing the torture of Mohammed al Qahtani, 31, have long been kept under wraps, but a discovery motion for video of his interrogations led the court to acknowledge their existence and order their release.

"The videotapes the government is required to produce will reveal the time period at the end of three months of intensive solitary confinement and isolation that immediately preceded the implementation of the 'First Special Interrogation Plan,' a regime of systematic torture techniques approved by former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld for use against Mr. al Qahtani," claimed a CCR media advisory.

Lawyers with the Center for Constitutional Rights have represented Qahtani since 2005. The accused 9/11 plotter has been a Guantanamo inmate since 2002.

According to Susan Crawford, convening authority at the Office of Military Commissions, "We tortured Qahtani."

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Crawford's statements to The Washington Post in Jan. 2009 made her the first senior Bush administration official to publicly state that a detainee was tortured.

"His treatment met the legal definition of torture. And that's why I did not refer the case" for prosecution said Crawford.

She added that US military interrogators repeatedly subjected Qahtani to sustained isolation, sleep deprivation, nudity and prolonged exposure to cold, leaving him in a "life-threatening condition."

"The techniques they used were all authorized, but the manner in which they applied them was overly aggressive and too persistent," she said.

"This was just a combination of things that had a medical impact on him, that hurt his health. It was abusive and uncalled for. And coercive. Clearly coercive. It was that medical impact that pushed me over the edge" to call it torture.

"Military prosecutors said in November that they would seek to refile charges against Qahtani [...] based on subsequent interrogations that did not employ harsh techniques," noted The Washington Post. "But Crawford, who dismissed war crimes charges against him in May 2008, said in the interview that she would not allow the prosecution to go forward.

"After the intense scrutiny of the government’s torture and interrogation of Mr. al Qahtani, it is shocking that the government has hidden the existence of these tapes from the public for so many years," said CCR Attorney Gitanjali S. Gutierrez. "The government’s interrogation of him has been the topic of multiple military, Justice Department and congressional investigations. These tapes should have been acknowledged long ago."

"Mr. al Qahtani’s torture is already well-established, with a clear paper trail that leads all the way up the chain of command to the desk of Donald Rumsfeld," said CCR Executive Director Vincent Warren. "The revelation of these tapes indicates the government carefully documented horrific evidence of torture and abuse at Guantánamo. The only question that remains is whether the people ultimately responsible for it will be held accountable for breaking the law and breaking faith with our system of justice."

The judge's order acknowledging the existence of the tapes and ordering their release may be read here (PDF link).

With AFP.

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Story comments are below...

  • carlitas
    Is that a recent picture? That kid doesn't look more than 18 years old at most. Hopefully during all that extensive torturing somebody thought to ask him how he and the other evil doers discovered that jet fuel could heat up sufficiently to melt steel and topple 100 storey buildings which would, in turn, cause another skyscraper to collapse in sympathy. This could be very useful information to physicists and engineers who have reportedly so far been unable to figure it out.
  • Satan
    Soldiers need something to jerk off to after all.
  • nader paul kucinich gravel
    United States of Israel.
    Treasury is Bankrupt.
    American Holocaust.
    9/11 False Flag.
    James Blunt
    No Bravery
  • manila
    I can well imagine, with all due respect to Judge Crawford, who came into office during the Bush administration, that this is going to be a plea-copping situation. It isn't going to be torture to the extent that some of the more outrageous interrogations have been. There are not going to be hundreds of water-boardings on the same man. There is going to be no breaking of bones or sexual insults. It's going to be pretty straightforward deprivation. Then when Rumsfeld is tried, there will be a measure of restraint in his sentencing, and he will get to keep his ill-gotten gains, whatever they surely are. The American public and the world at large will lay some flattering unction to itself, that we are really not that bad. Crawford is not the product of the elite system, and this will not be a stand against torture, but a way of dealing with the whole array of stuff yet unknown to us.
  • Max_1
    Hey...
    ... If I had proof of my crime, I'd hide the evidence, too. YES?
  • Max_1
    Proof, proof, and yet more proof...
    ... OF TORTURE W/ NO CONSEQUENCE!
  • Luath
    Well, that settles it for me. I don't need to see anything else. I already know. The government ADMITTED to a FELONIOUS CRIME, AN IMPEACHABLE,TREASONOUS CRIME. My government admits to torturing human beings. Therefore, I will not enable it further. Thus it is, that by its own admission, by its own words, my government has betrayed itself as wll as me. There have been no arrests. The behaviour on the part of law enforcement has been farcical as well as hypocritical. If one of us Joe Nobodies did these things, we would never again see the light of day. But this lumbering, slothful, behemoth, ogre-esque in its ways, is above the reach of the law??? Then, it is also, by default, above the need to monitor my every move. I have grown beyond the insecure need to trust. Fuck the parasitical vermin. They have outgrown their usefulness.
  • David Michael
    Lets hope Rummie spends the last years of his life in prison... maybe the same cell as the former Serbian President. Remember he also sold Sadam WMD's and provided him the intel when they were used. This is a violation of a treaty we signed and under that treaty he is a WAR CRIMINAL!
    Unfortunately Obama will never turn him over!
  • Schmice
    So does this mean that Americans who do not oppose using these techniques on "our enemies" should not complain when our nationals are subjected to the same treatment by "the other side"? Perhaps it would be better for the government not to show our handiwork because it might shock our sensibilities and we might not be able to look at ourselves in the same way anymore. Won't somebody please think of the children?
  • geo1671
    Fat chance the public will see any of the torture videos. Any bets? faces will be ZORRO masked
    Nothing will come of it---let's move on O'bama says-- I say-Nuts to you Sambo :^/
  • moi2cents
    As long as there are people like you, eager to stir the shit-pot of racism and hate, we will likely never be free from the abuse of state power, colored by cultural relativism.
    But thanks for highlighting the situation clearly.
  • Schmice
    "Sambo"? I'm surprised you were able to read the post through your Klansman's hood.
  • geo1671
    Dear Schmice
    FYI: Stable Boy Obama takes orders from Hillary RodentHurst Clinton.
    Shoveling shiit is one of his duties.The guy is a Kosherplant/tool,another of many Presidential pathological liars. Mind you, I'd trust him a million times over Bush and Clinton with any house/farm chores.
    Kidding aside--Obama is a goodman. Hillary wants his job. She is dangerous. If Obama keeps twisting on her witchcraft spells-he is toast 2012 :^/
  • Schmice
    "Stable Boy Obama"; "Hillary Rodent/Hurst Clinton"; "Kosherplant/tool" This is "kidding"? Too bad you aren't able to express an opinion intelligently without resorting to cheap shots which don't advance any meaningful discussion of the issues. As for his shoveling duties, I don't know what you mean, nor, I'm sure, do many others. Your reaching for "punchlines" that aren't there finishes your failed "argument" as totally ineffective. Too bad.
  • decora
    guess its too late for them to erase their tapes like the CIA did.

    '[why is standing limited to 4 hours... i stand at a desk for 8-10 hours a day]' -DR
  • marinessuck
    But you can't see it.
  • johnhkennedy
    Amazing how hard it is for reporters, bloggers and commenters to call Waterboarding and all the other crimes TORTURE!

    We Must Stop IT

    Sign the Petition
    calling for prosecution

    http://Angryvoters.Org
  • vultwulf
    My ancestors who fought for independence for the United States rebelled over less abusive behavior than this committed by English royal officials. It is in the Declaration of Independence, which is a huge rebuke to much of what the US did since the inception of the Cold War. As for the imperial stance, my Goth ancestors also defeated Rome for less than this. The time to act against the evildoers who have run the country since 1945, and especially during the last 9 years arrived some time ago. How many more revelations of abuse of power and abuse of authority on the part of US officials are required to get the public to act? The ultimate act is to overthrow an abusive regime, as the Declaration of Independence attests. Add to this the corrupt, fraudulent games in the financial system that both major political parties abetted and there are plenty of reasons for the public to act. It may be temporarily necessary to revert to government under the Articles of Confederation and start over to reform the abuses and restrain the US Government sufficiently to prevent abuses in the future.
  • Styve
    Wayne Madsen reported long ago that there were live-feeds of torture footage to offices in the WH and the VP's office. Wish that would make the MSM...
  • namerequierd
    Things like this, which any sane person knew happened despite government denial, are why the John Adams Project is a necessary venture for justice and the integrity of the United States of America's ability to have a legitimate government.

    SHAME ON THE TORTURERS AND MURDERERS OF AMERICA
  • buckqjohnson
    I'm sure Hitlers men where AUTHORIZED too. This is so much crap, americans must think that if others countries do this to our people it's torture but if we do it its not. We have done a horrible disservice to our own people. Some time in the future, we as a country won't be number one in the world and when that day comes people in other countries will be crying out for us to pay for our own crimes against the planet. Rumsfield, Cheney, the majority of Bushe's administration and many of the soldiers and CIA agents involved in this torture should be in the Hauge waiting trial for war crimes. But americans don't consider themselves bad people. Hypocrisy and delusion and also ignorance is a dangerous combination. It makes you see 3 lights instead of the 4 lights that are there (1984 reference). You see and hear and believe what the state and leaders of your group tells you is real.

    We as a nation is going to wake up one day and see that the rest of the planet is against us, and that frightens me.
  • donofcali
    They took these so Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld could watch them and masturbate together.
  • Schmice
    Oh please.
  • miggy
    The wrongs which we seek to condemn and punish have been so calculated, so malignant, and so devastating, that civilization cannot tolerate their being ignored, because it cannot survive their being repeated. That four great nations, flushed with victory and stung with injury stay the hand of vengeance and voluntarily submit their captive enemies to the judgment of the law is one of the most significant tributes that Power has ever paid to Reason.”

    “If we can cultivate in the world the idea that aggressive war-making is the way to the prisoner’s dock rather than the way to honors, we will have accomplished something toward making the peace more secure.”

    “We must never forget that the record on which we judge these defendants is the record on which history will judge us tomorrow. To pass these defendants a poisoned chalice is to put it to our own lips as well.”

    “If certain acts of violation of treaties are crimes, they are crimes whether the United States does them or whether Germany does them, and we are not prepared to lay down a rule of criminal conduct against others which we would not be willing to have invoked against us.”

    ~ Robert H. Jackson, chief United States prosecutor at the Nuremberg Trials.

    The United States of America War Criminals:
    1. Bush
    2. Cheney
    3. Rumsfeld
  • shane_b1968
    Awesome. Thank you.

    PS where are the knuckle dragging troll comments on this story? I thought there would be some right wing Bushies here for sure. Too embarrased to post maybe?
  • wellwellwell
    Torture, As american as apple pie these days.
  • bobdevo
    "The techniques they used were all authorized:

    Dear Ms. Crawford, just because Donald-fucking-Rumsfeld authorized a technique does NOT mean the technique was not torture under the Convention Against Torture and the Federal Torture Statute, 18 U.S.C. §§ 2340-2340B.
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