Mohammed Abdullah Al Hamiri

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Mohammed Abdullah Al Hamiri is a citizen of Yemen, held in extrajudicial detention in the United States Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, in Cuba.^[1] Al Hamiri's Guantanamo detainee ID number is 249. American intelligence analysts estimate Al Hamiri was born in 1982, in Hudaydah, Yemen.

1 Combatant Status Review Tribunal
2 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 a 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 administration's definition of an enemy combatant.

Al Hamiri had originally chosen to attend his Tribunal.^[2]

Al Hamiri changed his mind while he and his Personal Representative prepared, just prior to the Tribunal.

[edit] Allegations

The allegations Al Hamiri would have faced during his Tribunal were:

a. The detainee is associated with Al Qaida.

The detainee traveled from Yemen to Afghanistan via Pakistan in August 2001.
The detainee participated in military training at a camp in Kandahar, Afghanistan between 26 July and 18 September 2001.
The detainee was in Nabras guesthouse where he spoke to Osama bin Laden.
The detainee was captured in a group of Arab fighters while attempting to flee Afghanistan by Pakistani forces in December 2001.

[edit] witness request

Al Hamiri had requested his father's testimony. Al Hamiri had provided his father's current address. According to the Tribunal's President Al Hamiri's Personal Representative had told the President of Al Hamiri's witness request on November 16, 2004. The U.S. State Department had requested the assistance of the Yemeni embassy in Washington, on November 22, 2004, in taking the testimony of Abdullah Hemyari. After waiting what they considered a reasonable amount of time, and not getting a reply, the Tribunal's President had ruled Al Hamiri's father's testimony "not reasonably available".

One of the things Al Hamiri thought his father's testimony would have been able to confirm was that he had either a metal plate in his skull, or metal shards in his skull, and the sole purpose of his travel to Pakistan was to have an operation to remove the metal from his skull.