Mohammed Ahmad Said Al Edah

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Mohammed Ahmad Said Al Edah is a citizen of Yemen, held in extrajudicial detention in the United States Guantanamo Bay detainment camps, in Cuba.^[1] His detainee ID number is 033.

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 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.

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

Initially, the Bush administration asserted that it could withhold all of the protections of the Geneva Conventions from the captives of 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 Tribunals. The Tribunals, however, were not authorized to determine whether the captives were lawful combatants -- rather, they were merely empowered to make a recommendation whether the captives fit the Bush administration's definition of an enemy combatant.

[edit] allegations

The allegations that Al Edah faced in the "Summary of Evidence" presented to his Tribunal were:^[2]

a. The detainee is associated with forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States and its coalition partners:

The detainee traveled to Afghanistan in July 2001.
The detainee traveled from Kandahar to Khost, Afghanistan on a bus filled with wounded Taliban soldiers.
The detainee helped with the needs of the wounded Taliban soldiers during the bus trip.
The detainee was present in Kabul, during the U.S. air campaign there.
The detainee was arrested by Pakistani authorities, in Pakistan.
At the time of his capture, the detainee was in the possession of a Casio watch, model A159W (silver version of the F-91 W).
This model has been used in bombings that have been linked to al Qaida and radical Islamic terrorist improvised explosive devices.

[edit] Transcript

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

[edit] Responses to the allegations

Al Edah acknowledged traveling in Afghanistant in July 2001. He said he was accompanying his sister "..for the purpose of taking her to her husband. In the Muslim society, a woman does not travel by herself."

whether he traveled on a bus, from Kandahar to Khost, filled with Taliban soldiers, Al Edah replied:

"I did travel from Kandahar to Khost ... but I did not travel with soldiers from the Taliban. They were some people there that were injured. They were civilians or soldiers and as you know the Afghani people, they cannot tell the difference between the civilians or the soldiers because the clothing and uniforms are the same."

In response to the allegation that he helped nurse wounded Taliban soldiers while riding the bus, Al Edah replied:

"That is not correct. First, I'm not from that part of the world that I know the way; and, two, I don't have any experience in medical treatment. I was not working for a community or organization and I didn't have any money to help these people. In addition to that, I was injured myself."

Al Edah acknowledged being present, in Kabul, during the US bombing campaign.

Al Edah acknowledged being captured, while riding a bus, in Pakistan.

Al Edah acknowledged owning a digital watch. But disputed that it was a Casio Al 59W:

"I looked at the document that was presented to me by the Personal Representative and having looked at it, I knew that watch is not mine. When they captured me Pakistan, I had a watch. But because I did not know how to read and write the English language, I do not know the name of the watch, the model, I can tell the watch is mine only by looking at it. The document that the Personal Representative showed me, is not my watch."

Al Edah's Personal Representative then reported on the research he had done on the "Casio World Website", and further disputed that Al Edah should be detained because of the doubt whether he was wearing the watch in question, and because the Al 59W1 and F91W were both extremely common, inexpensive, simple watches.

[edit] Responses to Tribunal officer's questions

The reason Al Edah was traveling with his sister on a trip to join her husband in Afghanistan is that he was in Afghanistan working for a charitable organization. He could no longer recall the name of the charitable organization.

Al Edah confirmed he had gone through military training. He had been drafted, in 1982, in Yemen. He had military training, but it was compulsory.

Al Edah's worked at a Yemeni oil refinery.

When Al Edah was asked about the injuries that he incurred while in Afghanistan, he replied that he had fallen off of a motorcycle.

Al Edah was asked how he could prove that the wounded men on the bus were not Taliban soldiers, if, as he said, Taliban soldiers wore clothes indistinguishable from civilian clothes.

When asked why he was arrested in Pakistan Al Edah replied:

"I was on a bus. They were capturing everybody that had Arabic features. I gave them my passport, and that shows that I'm an Arab. They said, 'Why don't you follow us? We need you in the Center.' From that point on, they brought us over here."