Guantánamo Diary: ‘Torture squad so well trained that they were performing almost perfect crimes'

[kpete]

Guantánamo Diary: ‘The torture squad was so well trained that they were performing almost perfect crimes’
Interrogators subject Mohamedou Ould Slahi to the painstaking use of a new coercive technique: the cold room. Plus: Peter Serafinowicz reads an extract
• Declassified diary published at last
• Extract: The flight to Guantánamo
• Extract: Torture at sea
• Extract: False confession

Mohamedou Ould Slahi
Sunday 18 January 2015 08.56 EST


I started to recite the Koran quietly, for prayer was forbidden. Once ________ said, “Why don’t you pray? Go ahead and pray!” I was like, How friendly! But as soon as I started to pray, ____ started to make fun of my religion, and so I settled for praying in my heart so I didn’t give ____ the opportunity to commit blasphemy. Making fun of somebody else’s religion is one of the most barbaric acts. President Bush described his holy war against the so-called terrorism as a war between the civilized and barbaric world. But his government committed more barbaric acts than the terrorists themselves. I can name tons of war crimes that Bush’s government is involved in.

...................



“Stand up, motherfucker,” they both shouted, almost synchronous. Then a session of torture and humiliation started. They started to ask me the questions again after they made me stand up, but it was too late, because I told them a million times, “Whenever you start to torture me, I’m not gonna say a single word.” And that was always accurate; for the rest of the day, they exclusively talked.

_______ turned the air conditioner all the way down to bring me to freezing. This method had been practiced in the camp at least since August 2002. I had seen people who were exposed to the frozen room day after day; by then, the list was long. The consequences of the cold room are devastating, such as ______tism, but they show up only at a later age because it takes time until they work their way through the bones. The torture squad was so well trained that they were performing almost perfect crimes, avoiding leaving any obvious evidence. Nothing was left to chance. They hit in predefined places. They practiced horrible methods, the aftermath of which would only manifest later. The interrogators turned the A/C all the way down trying to reach 0°, but obviously air conditioners are not designed to kill, so in the well insulated room the A/C fought its way to 49°F, which, if you are interested in math like me, is 9.4°C—in other words, very, very cold, especially for some- body who had to stay in it more than twelve hours, had no underwear and just a very thin uniform, and who comes from a hot country. Somebody from Saudi Arabia cannot take as much cold as somebody from Sweden; and vice versa, when it comes to hot weather. Interrogators took these factors in con- sideration and used them effectively.

Mohamedou Ould Slahi: “smart, witty, garrulous, and curiously undamaged”
You may ask, Where were the interrogators after installing the detainee in the frozen room? Actually, it’s a good question. First, the interrogators didn’t stay in the room; they would just come for the humiliation, degradation, discouragement, or other factor of torture, and after that they left the room and went to the monitoring room next door. Second, interrogators were adequately dressed; for instance ______ was dressed like somebody entering a meat locker. In spite of that, they didn’t stay long with the detainee. Third, there’s a big psychological difference when you are exposed to a cold place for purpose of torture, and when you just go there for fun and a challenge. And lastly, the interrogators kept moving in the room, which meant blood circulation, which meant keeping themselves warm while the detainee was _________ the whole time to the floor, standing for the most part. All I could do was move my feet and rub my hands. But the Marine guy stopped me from rubbing my hands by ordering a special chain that shackled my hands on my opposite hips. When I get nervous I always start to rub my hands together and write on my body, and that drove my interrogators crazy.


More:
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/18/-sp-guantanamo-diary-the-torture-squad-was-so-well-trained-that-they-were-performing-almost-perfect-crimes-peter-serafinowicz?CMP=twt_gu

[gratuitous]

1. Oh well, all in the past

No sense looking backwards to the past, we have to look forward to the future. Besides, it's those radicals that are the real barbarians, what with the decapitations and such-like. Our faultless, star-spangled boys have the compassion to destroy the tapes, right Mr. Rodriguez? As the exceptionally exceptional United States of Under God America, we're above reproach or questioning, and none of our victims or their survivors are going to be able to get back directly at the people responsible for the torture anyway.

Which means that any righteous retribution will be visited on people who may even have protested against torturing our captives. Real nice of you dirty fucking hippies to take it for our team of benevolent overlords like that. "Due process" are just ancient words.

[zeemike]

2. +1

It is a sad history we have.

[heaven05]

3. not surprised

at all. Every nation has it's barbarians. We finally have shown ours and the PTB that are also, to this day, evading the Hague......sad.

[hootinholler]

4. The people are fortunate to have The Guardian

If we could only get an instutition like that going in the US