Mazin Salih Musaid

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Casio F91W, in daily alarm mode. The watch is currently set to ring an alarm, and flash its light, at 7:30am.

Mazin Salih Musaid is a Saudi citizen detained in the United States Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, in Cuba.^[1] Musaid's detainee ID number is 154.^[2] On the most recent of the two official lists of detainees his name is listed as Mazin Salih Musaid Al Awfi.

When the Department of Defense was forced to comply with US District Court Justice Jed Rakoff's court order to release the documents from the Guantanamo detainees's Combatant Status Review Tribunals Musaid's name came to light.^[1] The Detroit Free Press noted him as one of the detainees who was held, in part, because he was wearing a Casio F91W digital watch.

1 Combatant Status Review Tribunal
- 1.1 Allegations
- 1.2 Testimony
2 Administrative Review Board hearing
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 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.

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.

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

[edit] Allegations

The allegations against Musaid were:^[3]

a The Detainee is associated with Al Qaida.

Detainee’s name and telephone number were on a list of Al Qaida members that was discovered on a computer hard drive seized during raids on Al Qaida safe houses in Pakistan.
Detainee, at capture, had in his possession a Casio watch, model # F-91W, which has been used in bombings linked to Al Qaida.
Detainee stated he offered to help the Taliban.

b Detainee actively participated in operationss.

Detainee stated that he traveled to Afghanistan to fight the Jihad and fought with the Taliban in Kabul from June to December 2001.
Detainee was captured on the Pakistan border, by border guards, and processed into United States custody in Kandahar

[edit] Testimony

Musaid asserted that there was a case of mistaken identity:

"The name on that list was not my name, nor was the phone number. During on of these interrogations approximately one and half years ago, an interrogator showed me a list from the Al Qaida. He showed me a list of the names of people. The rest of the names were darkened out. When I looked at the name, I told the interrogator that is not my name. The name on the list was Salah Al Awfi. That was the name I saw on list, by name is Mazin Salih Musaid. My phone number is 831 2425. The telephone number on the list was not that number. The interrogator looked into this and came back to me and told me that Allah is with me, this is not your name."

Musaid is notable because one of the reasons he was detained was that he was captured wearing a Casio F91W digital watch.^[1]^[4] He told his Tribunal:

"I am a bit surprised as to this piece of evidence. Millions and millions of people have these types of Casio watches. If that is a crime, why doesn’t the United States arrest and sentence all the shops and people who own them. This is not a logical or reasonable piece of evidence, because I had a watch."

Musaid acknowledged offering to help the Taliban - but with humanitarian aid: “My departure was before any problems happened with America. If I had known, I would not have left.”

Translation errors marred understanding of how long Musaid was in Afghanistan. He said he left three months before Ramadan. He said he was there no more than four months, not the seven months the allegations against him claimed.

In answer to a question Musaid offered his definition of Jihad: "The term Jihad encompasses many things. One of them is fighting. Another thing is helping people. This includes all kind of help, for example, getting water or giving them food or any kind of humanitarian work."

[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.

Al Awfi chose to participate in his Administrative Review Board hearing.^[5]

[edit] Press reports

On July 12, 2006 the magazine Mother Jones provided excerpts from the transcripts of a selection of the Guantanamo detainees.^[6]The article informed readers:

More than a dozen detainees were cited for owning cheap digital watches, particularly “the infamous Casio watch of the type used by Al Qaeda members for bomb detonators.”

The article quoted Musaid, and three other watch owners:

"Millions and millions of people have these types of Casio watches. If that is a crime, why doesn’t the United States arrest and sentence all the shops and people who own them? This is not a logical or reasonable piece of evidence."