Abdul Ghafour (Guantanamo detainee 954)

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There are multiple individuals named Abdul Ghaffar.

Abdul Ghafour is a citizen of Afghanistan, held in extrajudicial detention in the United States Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, in Cuba.^[1] Abdul Ghafour's Guantanamo detainee ID number is 954. American intelligence analysts estimate that Abdul Ghafour was born in 1962, in Pattia Province [sic], Afghanistan.

1 Combatant Status Review Tribunal
- 1.1 Allegations
- 1.2 Testimony
2 Administrative Review Board hearing
- 2.1 The following factors favor continued detention:
- 2.2 The following primary factors favor release or transfer:
3 Press reports
4 References

[edit] Combatant Status Review Tribunal

Combatant Status Review Tribunals were held in a small trailer, the same width, but shorter, than a mobile home. The Tribunal's President sat in the big chair. The detainee sat with their hands and feet shackled to a bolt in the floor in the white, plastic garden chair. A one way mirror behind the Tribunal President allowed observers to observe clandestinely. In theory the open sessions of the Tribunals were open to the press. Three chairs were reserved for them. In practice the Tribunal only intermittently told the press that Tribunals were being held. And when they did they kept the detainee's identities secret. In practice almost all Tribunals went unobserved.

Initially the Bush administration 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 Tribunal. 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 administration's definition of an enemy combatant.

To comply with a Freedom of Information Act request, during the winter and spring of 2005, the Department of Defense released 507 memoranda. Those 507 memoranda each contained the allegations against a single detainee, prepared for their Combatant Status Review Tribunals. The detainee's name and ID numbers were redacted from all but one of the memoranda. However 169 of the memoranda had the detainee's ID hand-written on the top right hand of the first page corner. When the Department of Defense complied with a court order, and released official lists of the detainee's names and ID numbers it was possible to identify who those 169 were written about. Abdul Ghafour was one of those 169 detainees.^[2]

[edit] Allegations

a. The detainee is a member of the Taliban.

The detainee is the former district officer for the Taliban in Zormat, Afghanistan.
The detainee ordered an individual to emplace weapons caches in the Zormat district for use against U.S. forces.

b. The detainee participated in military operations against the United States or its coalition partners.

The detainee commanded a group of troops responsible for the 20-21 July 2002 bombings against the U.S. base in Gardez, Afghanistan.
The detainee fired on U.S. forces when they attempted to enter his property.

[edit] Testimony

Ghafour chose to participate in his Combatant Status Review Tribunal.^[3]

[edit] Administrative Review Board hearing

Detainees who were determined to have been properly classified as "enemy combatants" were scheduled to have their dossier reviewed at annual Administrative Review Board hearings. The Administrative Review Boards weren't authorized to review whether a detainee qualified for POW status, and they weren't authorized to review whether a detainee should have been classified as an "enemy combatant".

They were authorized to consider whether a detainee should continue to be detained by the United States, because they continued to pose a threat -- or whether they could safely be repatriated to the custody of their home country, or whether they could be set free.

Ghafour chose to participate in his Administrative Review Board hearing.^[4]

[edit] The following factors favor continued detention:

a. Connections/Associations

The detainee was the former district officer for the Taliban in Zormat, and was part of the leadership for the Zormat district Taliban network under Saifaullah Rahman Mansur
Saifur Rahman was the deputy commander of the Kargha garrison west of Kabul during the Taliban rule. He returned to his native Zurmat [sic] district in Paktia after the Taliban defeat.

b. Detainee Actions and Statements

The detainee was the commander of a group of 50 former Taliban in Neka, Paktika Province, Afghanistan. The group was part of Saifullah Rahman Mansour’s troops.
In late July 2002, Mansour’s group attacked locatoins in Gardez and Zormat including the United States’ compound in Gardez.
On 07 Feb 03, when United States and Afghan Military Forces attempted to search the Detainee’s home, the Detainee went to the roof and fired shots from his AK-47. United States and Afghan Military Forces returned fire.
The detainee’s neighbor fired upon the forces and United States and Afghan Military Forces returned fire to both locations.
After a firefight, United States forces negotiated with the detainee to surrender.

c. Other Relevant Data: The detainee denied having any position as a district officer in Zormat, though he was a leader at a time when the area was technically not a district.

[edit] The following primary factors favor release or transfer:

The detainee stated the occupation by United States forces was very good because he felt safer with United States forces providing security.

[edit] Press reports

On July 12, 2006 the magazine Mother Jones provided excerpts from the transcripts of a selection of the Guantanamo detainees.^[5] Ghafour was one of the detainees profiled. According to the article his transcript contained the following comment:

"I have a mother, my wife, kids, sister, and myself in my house. If I fired at Americans it meant suicide for my family. That means destroying and killing your own family…. I was not that crazy and not that stupid to shoot at Americans from my own roof. That’d mean I killed my own kids and family…. If I had known they were people from the government or they were Americans, this would have never happened. I was still thinking they were thieves and they came to rob us…. I don’t get it. Why am I in Cuba?"