Noorallah (Guantanamo ISN 539)

Haji Noorallah is an Afghan held in extrajudicial detention in the United States Guantanamo Bay detention camp, in Cuba.^[1] His Internment Serial Number in Guantanamo was 494.

Haji Noorallah was transferred to Afghanistan on August 25, 2006.^[2]

Noorallah is from Afghanistan's Uzbek community.

According to the Associated Press the allegations against Noorallah, in his Combatant Status Review Tribunal, stated he commanded 100 Taliban fighters along the Afghanistan-Uzbekistan border.

Noorallah stated: "My job was to take the new recruits to the Taliban. I was not a commander, and only brought the men to the Taliban. I brought 42 Taliban, not 100."

Combatant Status Review Tribunal

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.

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

Allegations

a. The detainee is a member of the Taliban:

1. The detainee first joined the Taliban and fought against the Northern Alliance when he was sixteen or seventeen years old, at which time he was trained on the AK-47 and served as afoot solder.
2. In 1998 or 1999 the detainee participated in ike attack and burning of a Shi'ite Muslim village, Choqma Choqor, and was later captured, then released, by General Dostum's Northern Alliance troops.
3. The detainee and two other Taliban commanders arranged for the surrender of their soldiers to General Dostum's Northern alliance force.

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

1. The detainee was the commander of one hundred Taliban fighters and fought along the Afghanistan/Uzbekistan border,

References

1. ^ list of prisoners (.pdf), US Department of Defense, April 20, 2006
2. ^ Haji Noorallah - The Guantánamo Docket
3. ^ Summarized transcripts (.pdf), from Haji Noorallah's Combatant Status Review Tribunal - pages 13-27

External links

• The Guantánamo Files: Website Extras (8) – Captured in Afghanistan Andy Worthington