Source:
smh.com.auASIO agent watched my torture, claims Habib
A MAN described as an ASIO agent stood by as a naked US marine wearing a condom threatened Mamdouh Habib with rape, the former Guantanamo Bay inmate alleges.
In a book to be published next week, Mr Habib says he saw the words "Allah Akbar"'
written on the condom to compound his humiliation.
The claims are detailed in My Story, excerpts of which will appear in Good Weekend tomorrow.
The book includes Mr Habib's first explanation of why he was in Afghanistan before the September 11 attacks.
Australian intelligence agencies have long accused Mr Habib of training with al-Qaeda during that period but Mr Habib says he fled to Afghanistan some weeks before the attacks after Pakistani police had abducted him and shot one of his companions while they were on a business trip.
Mr Habib recounts in excruciating detail the torture he says he was subjected to by Pakistani and Egyptian security agencies after his arrest in early October 2001, and describes the grim reality of life in Guantanamo Bay, where he was subsequently imprisoned.
In the book Mr Habib alleges:
■ That he and fellow Australian David Hicks stayed at the same Islamic guesthouse in Kabul in the days before the September 11 attacks. Mr Habib says he saw Mr Hicks in the company of the Melbourne man Jack Thomas (later known as Jihad Jack), and Richard Reid (the Briton who became known as the "shoe bomber" after he tried to blow up an aircraft with explosives hidden in his shoe).
■ While in Kandahar before September 11, Mr Habib says he met Matthew Stewart, a former Australian soldier who complained about the "rape and murder" committed by Australian peacekeepers in East Timor.
■ When Mr Habib and Mr Hicks met in Guantanamo Bay, Mr Hicks apologised for telling people that Mr Habib was a CIA plant (a claim Mr Habib says resulted in inmates spitting and urinating on him).
(snip)
Mr Habib repeats earlier claims that an Australian diplomatic official saw him in Pakistan prior to his rendition and did nothing to prevent it.
The Australian Government has always denied this although the former ASIO head Dennis Richardson told a Senate committee in 2005 that an ASIO officer had seen Mr Habib in Pakistan on three occasions in October 2001 after his arrest.
In June this year the current ASIO head, Paul O'Sullivan, revealed for the first time that US officials had sought Australia's views on Mr Habib's "transfer to Egypt" shortly after his arrest but that Mr Richardson had said Canberra could not support it. However, Howard ministers had previously denied official knowledge of how Mr Habib got to Egypt.
In Egypt, Habib alleges he was subjected to excruciating torture, including electric shocks to his testicles and being made to stand in a room which was slowly flooded up to the level of his nose.
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/asio-watched-my-torture/2008/10/23/1224351449199.html?page=3
ASIO- Australian Security Intelligence Organisation
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