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Former Guantanamo detainees ‘were tortured’

LONDON: Two Britons freed from Guantanamo Bay have written an open letter to President George W. Bush alleging they were tortured while in US military detention there, a lawyer acting for the men said Friday.

Shafiq Rasul and Asif Iqbal, who were released from the US facility in Cuba after two years in detention, said their treatment was similar to that allegedly inflicted on Iraqi prisoners by their American captors.

“Really what they are trying to do is to make sure that it is clear to the world that what happened to them didn’t happen in a vacuum and this is very much part of the policy of the American military in handling all these various situations around the world,” lawyer Barbara Olshansky, of the Center for Constitutional Rights in New York City, told British Broadcasting Corp. radio.

Since their release, Rasul, Iqbal and three other Britons released from Guantanamo have previously claimed they were beaten, interrogated at gunpoint and subjected to degrading treatment during their detention. US authorities deny the men were mistreated.

Olshansky said her clients “were very clear that they were shackled for hours on end, and made to stand in stressed positions when being questioned by the military interrogators.”

“They were subjected to threatening dogs, freezing cold temperatures, being made to stand naked, the same type of humiliation and stress techniques that were used in Iraq.

“I think that they are quite clear that this was the policy in place at Guantanamo Bay. They have made clear from the outset that, right from the moment of their arrival, they were subjected to these types of interrogation and intimidation methods.

“It appeared to them that this was the routine and the method of extracting information from people there.”

Four Britons remain in custody at Guantanamo Bay: Feroz Abbasi, 23; Moazzam Begg, 36; Martin Mubanga, 29 and Richard Belmar, 23. Britain has insisted its nationals either receive fair trials or be sent home. —AP

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