Abdullah Mujahid

Infobox WoT detainees
subject_name = Abdullah Mujahid

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image_size =
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date_of_birth = Birth year and age|1971
place_of_birth = Paktia, Afghanistan
date_of_arrest =
place_of_arrest= | arresting_authority=
date_of_release = | place_of_release=
date_of_death = | place_of_death =
citizenship = | detained_at = Guantanamo
id_number = 1100
group =
alias =
charge = no charge, held in extrajudicial detention
penalty =
status = Repatriated in the fall of 2007
csrt_summary =
csrt_transcript=
occupation = | spouse = | parents = | children =

Abdullah Mujahid is a citizen of Afghanistan held in extrajudicial detention in the United States Guantanamo Bay detention camps, in Cuba.cite web
url=http://www.dod.mil/news/May2006/d20060515%20List.pdf
title=List of Individuals Detained by the Department of Defense at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba from January 2002 through May 15, 2006
author=OARDEC
publisher=United States Department of Defense
date=May 15 2006
accessdate=2007-09-29] His Guantanamo Internee Security Number is 1100.

According to the Associated Press the allegations against Mujahid, in his Combatant Status Review Tribunal, state Mujahid was head of security for the city of Gardez and for Paktia province. [http://www.wtop.com/index.php?nid=389&sid=727171&page=7 Sketches of Guantanamo Detainees-Part I] , "WTOP", March 15 2006] He was accused of ties to al Qaeda and of attacking U.S. forces, and was arrested in July 2003.

Mujahid claimed he was loyal to the coalition. [http://www.wtop.com/index.php?nid=389&sid=727171&page=7 Sketches of Guantanamo Detainees-Part I] , "WTOP", March 15 2006]

Background

Abdullah Mujahid is militia leader from Afghanistan's Tajik ethnic group, who rose up against the Taliban in the closing days of its administration of Afghanistan.cite news
url=http://www.boston.com/news/world/middleeast/articles/2007/08/12/us_behind_afghan_warlords_rise_fall/
title=US behind Afghan warlord's rise, fall: At Guantanamo, unruly chieftains join combatants
author=Farah Stockman
publisher=Boston Globe
date=August 12 2007
accessdate=2007-09-18] The Afghanistan Transitional Authority rewarded Mujahid, and other militia leaders who had risen up against the Taliban, with the control of security forces. Both Mujahid and Pacha Khan Zadran, a Pashtun from the Zadran tribe, were rewarded with security appointments in Paktia province.

Mujahid and Zadran struggled to consolidate greater shares of control over Paktia's security forces.Mujahid and Zadran's forces were reported to have engaged in gun battles during their disputes. Both men's forces were accused of abusing their authority and routinely robbing civilians at their roadblocks.

By 2003 both men were regarded as renegades and enemies by US forces.

A high-level delegation from Kabul visited Mujahid, and offered him a nominally more senior position in Kabul as a "Highway Commander". Mujahid accepted this offer, and yielded up his posiiton as Chief of Police of Gardez, and traveled to Kabul. But the promised promotion never materialized. When Mujahid returned hom to Gardez, he was sent to Guantanamo.

Zadran's nephew, and Lieutenant, Jan Baz, was also apprehended and sent to Bagram Theater detention facility. But Zadran remained at large, and now represents Paktia in the Afghan Parliament.

Mujahid faced a number of allegations during his Combatant Status Review Tribunal and Administrative Review Board hearings: notably that he was fired for corruption and collusion with the opposition, that he was a senior commander of Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Pakistani militant group based in Kashmir. He was also accused of currently being a member of Harakat-e-Mulavi, a group which American intelligence analysts believe is now allied with the rebels.

Mujahid's lawyers assert that the Lashkar-e-Taiba connection is a case of mistaken identity. A senior commander of the Lashkar-e-Taiba, also named Abdullah Mujahid, was killed in 2006. Mujahid's lawyers acknowledge that he fought with Harakat-e-Mulavi, against some of Afghanistan's foreign occupiers -- during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, during the 1980s.

All of the allegations against Mujahid have been dropped in early 2007, and he was cleared for release. But, as of August 2007, he still remains in Guantanamo.

Combatant Status Review Tribunal

] Three chairs were reserved for members of the press, but only 37 of the 574 Tribunals were observed.cite web
url=http://www.defenselink.mil/transcripts/transcript.aspx?transcriptid=3902
title=Annual Administrative Review Boards for Enemy Combatants Held at Guantanamo Attributable to Senior Defense Officials
publisher=United States Department of Defense
date=March 6 2007
accessdate=2007-09-22] ]

Initially the Bush Presidency asserted that they could withhold all the protections of the Geneva Conventions to captives from the war on terror. This policy was challenged before the Judicial branch. Critics argued that the USA could not evade its obligation to conduct competent tribunals to determine whether captives are, or are not, entitled to the protections of prisoner of war status.

Subsequently the Department of Defense instituted the Combatant Status Review Tribunals. The Tribunals, however, were not authorized to determine whether the captives were "lawful combatants" -- rather they were merely empowered to make a recommendation as to whether the captive had previously been correctly determined to match the Bush Presidency's definition of an enemy combatant.

Summary of Evidence memo

A Summary of Evidence memo was prepared for Abdullah Mujahid'sCombatant Status Review Tribunal, on 15 October 2004.cite web
url=http://www.dod.mil/pubs/foi/detainees/csrt_arb/000700-000783.pdf#51
title=Summary of Evidence for Combatant Status Review Tribunal -- Mujahid, Abdullah
date=15 October 2004
author=OARDEC
pages=page 51
publisher=United States Department of Defense
accessdate=2007-12-09] The memo listed the following allegations against him:

:

Transcript

Mujahid chose to participate in his Administrative Review Board hearing.cite web
url=http://www.defenselink.mil/pubs/foi/detainees/csrt/ARB_Transcript_Set_11_21662-22010.pdf#206
title=Summary of Administrative Review Board Proceedings of ISN 1100
date=date redacted
author=OARDEC
pages=page 206
publisher=United States Department of Defense
accessdate=2007-12-16]

Response to the factors

* Mujahid confirmed he fought against the Soviets -- for about eight months, when he was sixteen or seventeen. After the Soviets withdrew he fought against the Communist government that had been left behind.
* Mujahid confirmed that he had worked for the Rabbani government prior to the Taliban regime, and had served as a police officer after its fall. But, during the Taliban's regime he laid low, and worked as a simple farmer.
* Mujahid denied participating in an anti-US attack in Gardez. He disputed that this incident took place.
* In response to the allegation that he was a "former Lashkar-e-Tayyiba commander" he asked the time frame when he was supposed to have filled this role. He said he had given his interrogators a full account of his life, and there were no gaps in it when he could have been a Lashkar-e-Tayyiba. He added:
* After the factor where Lashkar-e-Tayyiba's roots in Pakistan were outlined he pointed out:

Mujahid and the claim that captives were "captured on the battlefield"

On August 12 2007 Farah Stockman, writing in the "Boston Globe" used Mjuahid'd story to comment on the Bush administration's claim that Guantanamo captives had been apprehended "on the battlefield".Stockman described Mujahid as an early supporter during the overthrow of the Taliban, whose usefulness waned after their ouster, because he was illiterate, and was rumored to be corrupt.Stockman wrote: quotation
A Globe investigation found that the military has used Guantanamo Bay not just for terrorists "picked up on the battlefield" -- as Bush has repeatedly asserted -- but also for uncooperative or unruly tribal chieftains, many of whom had been key supporters of the US-led invasion.

References