Abdul Zahir (Guantanamo detainee 753)

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This article is about Abdul Zahir, the alleged al Qaeda member. For the 20th century Afghan politician by the same name, see Abdul Zahir.

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Abdul Zahir is an Afghan detained in United States naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.^[1] Charges were leveled against Zahir on January 20, 2006, by the Guantanamo military commissions.^[2]

Zahir's Guantanamo detainee ID number is 753.^[3] American intelligence analysts estimate he was born in 1972, in Hasarak, Afghanistan.

Zahir was charged with conspiracy, aiding the enemy and attacking civilians.^[4]^[5]^[6] Zahir is the tenth detainee to be charged.

1 Combatant Status Review Tribunal
- 1.1 Allegations
- 1.2 Testimony
2 See also
3 References
4 External links

[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 his 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.

Originally the Bush administration had asserted that the United States could detain indefinitely anyone captured in Afghanistan. Several of the President's legal advisors had stated that the USA was not bound by the Geneva Conventions in Afghanistan; Al Qaeda fighters didn't qualify because they weren't answering to a sovereign state; Taliban fighters didn't qualify because almost no other states recognized the Taliban as a legitimate, sovereign government.

Critics mounted legal challenges to this policy. Justice James Robertson ruled that the United States was obliged under article 5 of the third Geneva Convention to treat all prisoners as lawful combatants, who would be entitled to prisoner of war status, unless a competent tribunal had determined that they were not lawful combatants.

The Combatant Status Review Tribunals and the Administrative Review Boards were instituted in response. However, the final terms of reference for these bodies did not give them the authority to determine whether or not a captive was a lawful combatant who qualified for POW status.

Zahir was one of the 317 detainees who chose to testify before his Tribunal.^[7]

[edit] Allegations

The allegations against Zahir were:^[7]

a Detainee is a member of Al Qaida

Detainee was a translator for Abdul Hadi, a known member of Al Qaida for a period of three years.
Detainee translated for HADI when he spoke with Mullah Abdul Satar Ahmadi, the leader of Taliban soldiers in the North of Kabul.
Detainee is able to identify several members of Al Qaida and the Taliban from his stay in the ASHARA.
Detainee's duties were to safe keep and distribute funds for various Al-Qaida and Taliban members.

b Detainee engaged in hostilities against the United States and/or it’s ^[sic] coalition partners.

-missing from the transcript-
...involved in a grenade attack on Western journalists in the spring of 2002.

[edit] Testimony

Asserted he was just an employee, and had no affiliation with Al Qaeda – would not have joined Al Qaeda because it was a terrorist group..

Acknowledged translating between Al Iraqi and Satar.

Didn't get to know any foreigners at the guesthouse because his boss wouldn't let him...

Never handled money when he worked for Hadi. Acknowledged accepting $40,000 from Hadi, in trust, when he fled Afghanistan. Acknowledged passing it on to a single individual.

Denied engaging in hostilities. Said that he believed that the allegation that he was involved in an attack on Western journalists was merely because he was able to inform American authorities who did launch the attack. Pointed out that he didn’t flee when Al Qaeda and the Taliban fled, because he didn’t think he had anything to fear because he hadn’t done anything wrong.