SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico, May 7, 2008
Ex-Guantanamo Prisoner ID'd As Iraq Bomber
U.S. Military Confirms Former Detainee Carried Out Recent Suicide Attack In Mosul
-
On May 7, 2008, a spokesman for U.S. military's Central Command confirmed that former Guantanamo detainee Abdullah al-Ajmi took part in suicide attacks in Mosul. ()
-
Interactive Gitmo Tribunals Detainees on trial, photos and a history of the naval base.
-
Interactive Battle For Iraq The government, the insurgency, key players, background and photos.
Abdullah Saleh al-Ajmi took part in one of three suicide bomb attacks last month in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, said U.S. Navy Cmdr. Scott Rye, a military spokesman.
It appears to be the first time someone who was held at the prison at the U.S. base in Cuba has carried out a suicide attack, said a Pentagon spokesman, Navy Cmdr. Jeffrey Gordon.
Al-Ajmi, 29, was transferred in 2005 to Kuwait, where the government was supposed to ensure he would not pose a threat. In May 2006, a Kuwaiti court acquitted him and four other former Guantanamo prisoners of terrorism charges.
Dubai-based al-Arabiya television, citing a cousin of al-Ajmi, last week reported that he had carried out a suicide attack, but the U.S. military could not confirm it until Wednesday.
Rye said in an e-mail to The Associated Press that al-Ajmi's family has confirmed his death and that authorities determined he entered Iraq through Syria.
"It is unknown what motivated him to leave Kuwait and go to Iraq," Rye said. "His family members reportedly were shocked to hear he had conducted a suicide bombing."
Three suicide car bombers targeted Iraqi security forces, killing at least seven people and wounding 28 in the northern city of Mosul, local officials said. It was not yet known which involved al-Ajmi.
Military documents previously released to AP show that al-Ajmi was "constantly in trouble" while in Guantanamo and held in disciplinary blocks during his detention. He also allegedly told officials in August 2004 that "he now is a jihadist, an enemy combatant, and that he will kill as many Americans as he possibly can."
Tom Wilner, a lawyer who represented Kuwaiti prisoners at Guantanamo, said al-Ajmi had a broken arm during one of their meetings at the base in Cuba and that he alleged he had been injured by guards who interrupted him while he prayed.
Wilner called the alleged suicide attack a "tragedy" that could have been avoided with court hearings for prisoners held at Guananamo, where the U.S. now holds about 270 men.
"The lack of a process results in tragic mistakes on both sides," the lawyer said.
American officials have said in the past that more than a dozen former Guantanamo prisoners engaged in hostilities against U.S. forces or its allies, an assertion that critics have challenged.
In other developments:
© MMVIII, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Add a Comment See all 99 Comments
- Come on. When will we learn. Muslim = held and tortured in Guantanamo Bay for 3 1/2 years without legal rights would make almost any normal person angry and want to strike back at the illegal detention by the US Governement. It wouldn''''t take much to convince them to do this.
Posted by jboxton at 01:28 PM : May 09, 2008 - Reply to this comment
- cornbiker- HILARIOUS!!! O&A reference?
- Reply to this comment
- Come on. When will we learn. Muslim = terrorist. Why do they keep acting suprised when they find out the suicide bomber was a member of their family. Muslims are uneducated easily tricked dolts who have weak minds. It wouldn''t take much to convince them to do this.
- Reply to this comment
- pzabbie
I am glad someone with real knowledge mof the situation has been able to comment on this situation. If it saves American lives i don''t care how many of the enemy we have to torture to get information. I am against the war in Iraq but we still have to fight the terrorists. - Reply to this comment
- Yo lo veo asi:
Pillamos unos cuantos arabes, los metemos en un avion y alli los levamos a la carcel ilegal de Guantanamo. Los volvemos locos y luego los soltamos en Iraq.
Estos se vengan haciendo atentados. Y asi justificamos la presencia militar en un pais donde no habia armas de destruccion masiva y que ya no tien el dictador. Pero del que queremos el Oil y montar bases militares para controlar a Rusia y China. - Reply to this comment
- Good job libs for fighting Gitmo. Everyone there should be tortured for info and then exterminated like the vermin that they are.
- Reply to this comment
- Nancy_Naive--Remember when they were reporting a couple of years ago that many of the cars used in the bombings were stolen in the US? Always associated the trade in stolen vehicles across the US border to Mexico that Frank Sturgis was associated with decades ago....as if the insurgents couldn''t find some rolling shrapnel in Iraq to place explosives in...
- Reply to this comment
- As pressure has built to close the Guantanamo concentration camp, it would be in the interest of the Regime to get some positive PR about the necessity of keeping their victims caged up forever.
Reading the article, we come away with no idea as to why he was incarcerated for 3 1/2 years...just for "terrorism". Do we have any kind of post-mortem reports? The results should have come back immediately if so much as a fingerprint were entered into the system. The lag in time between the alleged bombing and the naming of the suspect leads one to the conclusion that the fellow was simply murdered and then accused.
I wouldn''t think that the best way out of Camp G would be to tell the people who had been torturing you that you were a jihadist and were going to kill lots of Americans...seems a bit at odds with the whole theme and spirit of the place...
It would have been suspicious indeed if he had been released directly from Gitmo and then, like a Manchurian candidate, blew himself and others up...did he actually kill any Americans in his alleged suicide bombing?
Instead he is given up to our ally Kuwait who released him and then he ends up in Mosul? Why? What happened in between?
The propagandists paint a picture and leave out a whole bunch of information that might raise questions about the Regime''s slant on the bombing. - Reply to this comment
- It is not a suprise when prisoners - especially prisoners who have been brutally abused - subsequently commit violence against others and or themselves.
No points are scored for confirming this tragic phenomena.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by CBS_Oliver at 08:03 AM : May 08, 2008
LIBS are sooo funny. - Reply to this comment
- CATCH HIM and kill him dead!
- Reply to this comment
Ex-NBA ref Tim Donaghy 
