Date Posted:07:49:03 07/23/06 Sun Author: Camouflage Subject: Without A Doubt In reply to:
Ry
's message, "U.S. Democracy at work ?" on 07:31:13 07/23/06 Sun
Kuwait's appeals court have upheld the acquittal of five former inmates of Guantanamo accused of fighting against US forces in Afghanistan under the former Taliban regime.
"All of them have been acquitted," Mubarak al-Shimmari, a member of the defense team, told AFP Saturday.
A lower court had cleared the five men of the charges in May.
Abdulaziz al-Shimmari, Adel al-Zamel, Mohammed al-Deehani, Saad al-Azemi and Abdullah al-Ajmi were repatriated to Kuwait last November 4 after spending almost four years at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, a detention camp set up after the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 amid outrage from human rights groups.
>An Algerian man believed to be the last domestic
>detainee still in custody from a national dragnet
>after Sept. 11 — and who was cleared of links to
>terrorism in November 2001 — was set free this week,
>his lawyer said Friday.
>Benemar Benatta, 32, went to Ontario, Canada, where he
>is seeking political asylum, after being released from
>a Buffalo immigration lockup Thursday, attorney
>Catherine Amirfar said.
>
>"After five years, he had become all but hopeless,"
>she said. "Now he's cautiously optimistic."
>
>Benatta was among 1,200 mostly Arab and Muslim men
>detained nationwide as potential suspects or witnesses
>in the investigation following the terrorist attacks.
>The government has refused to discuss their fate, but
>human rights groups have said they believed the former
>Algerian air force lieutenant was the only one still
>in custody.
>
>Heather Tasker, a spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney in
>Manhattan, refused to discuss Benatta's release, which
>was first reported by The Washington Post.
>
>U.S. officials agreed to release Benatta after the
>Canadian Consulate General's office in Buffalo granted
>him temporary residency, according to court papers
>filed Wednesday in New York.
>
>The last detainee's odyssey began Sept. 5, 2001, when,
>after overstaying a six-month visa, he crossed the
>border near Buffalo to seek asylum in Canada. After
>the Sept. 11 attacks, his background as a Muslim man
>with flight experience prompted Canadian officials to
>turn him over to U.S. authorities.
>
>He spent the next six months in solitary confinement
>in a federal jail in Brooklyn. Though the FBI
>concluded he had no links to terrorism, he was
>eventually charged with carrying false identification
>— a case that was dropped after a federal magistrate
>found his right to due process had been violated.
>
>The magistrate wrote in a 2003 decision that Benatta
>had been "undeniably deprived of his liberty," and
>"held in custody under harsh conditions which can be
>said to be oppressive."
>
>Despite the ruling, immigration officials kept him in
>custody in Buffalo while he appealed a deportation
>order and renewed his quest for asylum based on a
>claim that, as a military deserter, he would tortured
>or killed if he returned to Algeria.
>
>A United Nations human rights group that studied the
>case noted that most asylum seekers are released
>pending the outcome of their cases.
>
>"The imprisonment Mr. Benatta has endured has been a
>de facto prison sentence," the U.N. group wrote in
>findings made public in March. "In no way can the
>simple administrative offense of having stayed in the
>United States after his visa had expired justify such
>a disproportionate sentence."
zzzzz zzzz zzzzz (NT) -- Pud, 10:30:09 07/23/06 Sun