Jamil El Banna - Allegations of Torture

Allegations of Torture

Jamil's lawyer, Clive Stafford Smith, quoted in an article in The Guardian, said Jamil was a participant in both the hunger strike that ended when the camp authorities made promises on July 28, 2005, and a second that started on August 8. Smith said that Jamil told him that one of the reasons for the second hunger strike was that guards were still searching through the prisoner's copies of the Qur'an by hand.

An article in The Times repeated Jamil's claim that his American interrogators told him that MI5 had colluded in Jamil's extraordinary rendition. The lawyers of Guantanamo Bay detainees have to hand in all their notes. They are all classified. The lawyers are only allowed to examine their notes in a single secure location outside Washington DC. The Times describes how a section of Stafford Smith's notes were recently declassified:

"In Cuba one interrogator is alleged to have told el-Banna: 'Why are you angry at America? It is your government, Britain, the MI5, who called the CIA and told them you and Bisher were in Gambia and to come and get you. Britain gave everything to us. Britain sold you out to the CIA.'”

The Times repeats Jamil's claim that he was offered $10 million, and a US passport, if he would testify against Abu Qatada. According to The Times:

"When he refused, an interrogator told him: 'I am going to London . . . I am going to fuck your wife. Your wife is going to be my bitch. Maybe you’ll never see your children again.'"