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The Strange case of Aafia Siddiqui (continued)

Aafia Siddiqui is an American-educated Pakistani woman, who disappeared under mysterious circumstances five years ago shortly after leaving her Mother’s home.  Since her disappearance, numerous reports have surfaced alleging that she was kidnapped by Pakistani Security agents and handed over to U.S. authorities. The FBI were seeking information from Dr. Aafia and had already indicated that she was a "terrorist" suspect. Her American lawyer says that after being handed over to the Americans, she was taken to Afghanistan and spent five years there incarcerated in a U.S.-controlled prison facility at Bagram airbase.

In July of this year Dr. Aafia was arrested by Afghan police. A U.S. spokesman said she was arrested while "loitering" in the street near an Afghan police station. The FBI says that shortly after that – U.S. agents and military personnel made arrangements to question her. They allege that somehow she got hold of a gun belonging to one of the soldiers and began shooting. However, none of the Americans was wounded.

She was charged with attempting to kill American officials and taken to New York to be arraigned.

A Judge ordered her to receive medical and psychiatric treatment and Aafia has now been transferred to a womens medical and psychiatric institution at the Carswell Airbase, near Fort Worth Texas.

Dr. Aafia’s Pakistani supporters fear that she will be mistreated at the Carswell prison and say they are concerned for her physical well being.

The prison has a history of mysterious deaths and unusual medical practices, including forced medication of inmates.

Journalist Betty Brink of the Fort Worth Weekly wrote this report about Carswell in 2005.

Brink wrote a second article about the same facility this year for Ms. Magazine.

Other articles have described the facility as "an American Gulag", a "hellhole", and a "snake-pit".

It would seem that there may be some basis for the fears expressed by Aafia’s Pakistani supporters.

Do The American Authorities Intend To Do Away With Dr. Aafia?

Dr. Aafia Siddiqui, the Pakistani woman who was kidnapped and detained for 5 years in an American-controlled prison in Afghanistan is about to enter a new phase of her already tortured existence. Dr. Aafia was identified by the FBI as a terrorist "suspect".

Let’s be clear however,…there has never been any evidence against her beyond what could be described as circumstantial. Read my first post on this matter here.

She was supposedly captured in Afghanistan under mysterious circumstances and taken by the FBI by plane to New York. American officials who asked to remain anonymous have said that she is not charged with any terrorist crimes, because of insufficient evidence.

(Her supporters contend that she was kidnapped in Pakistan by the Musharraf governemtn and handed over to American agents).

When the CIA plane arrived in the United States, she was arraigned before a New York City Judge, who entered a plea of "not guilty" for her.

Her lawyers said she was truamatized by 5 years of imprisonment and torture in Afghanistan and was too ill to testify even in her own behalf.

Perhaps as a result of the trauma she had already suffered, Dr. Siddiqui refused to undergo the strip search and cavity examination New York authorities said were required to be performed on her before she could appear in court. As a result, she did not appear in court to testify.

The Court, including the Judge, the Prosecution and the Defence said that Dr. Aafia must undergo psychiatric and psychological tests to determine whether or not she is fit to be tried.

But instead of calling in a team of recognized doctors in New York, it was ordered that the Pakistani Mother of three be transferred to one of America’s most notorious prison facilities for women, located in Texas. Her family and friends in Pakistan – and many of her western supporters – are convinced that it’s all part of an American plan to kill her. Check this out: Carswell:A former Airbase

Certainly the prison to which she is being transferred has a reputation as "a house of horrors".

As everyone knows, I have been following this story closely and will continue to do so.

Next I will share with you some background on the Texas prison to which Dr. Aafia is being transferred.

This Weekend: The International Day of Peace: Reflecting On Human Rights and Peacekeeping

The International Day of Peace was established by the United Nations General Assembly in 1981, to commemorate and strengthen the ideals of peace amongst all peoples.

Twenty years later, the General Assembly set 21 September as the annual date to observe the the day as one of global ceasefire and non-violence. No citizen of the world is holding his/her breath, however.

This year, the world commemorates the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, as well as the 60th anniversary of UN peacekeeping.

In the aftermath of World War II, world leaders acknowledged that disregard and contempt for human rights resulted in barbarous acts and have for decades now, prevented us from having a world in which all human beings can enjoy…freedom from fear and persecution.

Sadly, we are still struggling to achieve this vision.

Today’s many conflicts, from wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to conflicts in the Occupied Palestinian
Territory, Darfur, Somalia and the Democratic Republic of  Congo, cause unnecessary loss of life; the violence has a devastating impact on social structures such as education, health and justice systems, and the maintenance of law and order.

All conflicts are deeply rooted in grievances caused by systematic human rights violations, discrimination, marginalization and an absence of accountability, that often manifest themselves long before the actual violence begins. The conflicts themselves result in profound and shocking cases of abuse.

Millions of people have crossed borders as refugees, or have been forced to live as internally-displaced persons within their own countries. Thousands have been victims of sexually-based violence, a consequence of the lawlessness that prevails during wartime and, increasingly, a tactic used by warring factions.

Hundreds of thousands of children who live in war zones are denied the right to education. They lose basic social services such as shelter, sanitation, access to clean drinking water, health care and even food. When the rule of law collapses, other rights, such as the right to a fair trial, are lost, giving rise to abuses such as torture. Freedom of movement is curtailed as checkpoints, roadblocks and walls are set up by State and non-State parties to a conflict. Worst of all, people are killed in violation of their fundamental right to life.

We know that the protection of human rights by State and non-State actors is essential if we are to achieve a lasting peace. The return and reintegration of displaced populations and refugees, accountability for past atrocities, the rebuilding of the judiciary and other fundamentals of a democratic society are an indispensable part of peace efforts and post-conflict reconstruction.

Our hope must be for a stronger United Nations, determined to help the victims of conflict.

We need a tougher U.N. that will prick the conscience of world leaders and issue warnings to all states and groups, engaged in terror.

We need a more determined U.N. to help ease suffering and restore the basic rights of normal life. A U.N. that is more compassionate and more tolerant and more understanding.

The UN does its best to advance the cause of peace and to protect the human rights of the world’s people.

Unfortunately the United Nations is failing in its duty. Ideals are turned to dust by leaders who care more for their own power than for the rights of people. The rights of millions turn to smoke as leaders concentrate on narrow, selfish goals.

The U.N. tries but the U.N. fails. And it fails because its member states fail.

Right now, more than 100,000 troops, police and civilians are deployed with 17 peacekeeping operations around the world, in hot spots such as Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and the Middle East. But the U.N. can only achieve as much as world leaders wish it to achieve. Despite the United Nations’ best efforts, those who could bring these conflicts to an end, refuse to do so.

The UN cannot achieve its goals without the unstinting support of all the nations and all the leaders of the world. Hundreds of U.N. missions will waste their efforts, if they continue to be undermined by headstrong member states, bent on imposing their will on others.

The United Nations takes its strength from the support of all of its members. Sadly, that support is not always forthcoming. In fact it is hardly ever forthcoming.

The United Nations is suffering as the people of the world are suffering and the criminal leaders and terrorists of the world are responsible.

On the occasion of this International Day of Peace, we must send a powerful signal for peace that will be read, heard and felt around the world – not just by all the people of the world, but by the leaders of the world.

Dr. Aafia Siddiqui: Next Court Date September 22

A senior Pakistani Embassy diplomat met with Dr. Aafia Siddqui in the Brooklyn detention center on Saturday after U. S. authorities agreed to Pakistan’s request for consular access.

Many say she was the only female prisoner, ‘Prisoner 650’, held at the U.S. detention center 60 kilometers from Kabul.

One of her lawyers, Gideon Oliver, and a U.S. representative, were also present during Counselor Faqir Asif Hussain’s meeting with Dr. Aafia, as she is referred to in Pakistan.

Afterwards, Faqir Asif Hussain said he assured Dr. Aafia that the embassy would make every possible effort to ensure that she was not discriminated against and that efforts would be made to ensure that she was provided appropriate medical treatment.

She asked that her government to make sure that her trial is fair.

Dr. Aafia also requested that she be provided halal food and a copy of the Quran and local timings for prayers as well as a good female doctor. The Pakistani diplomat conveyed these requests to the U.S. authorities who promised to provide them for her. She was transported to the United States last week on charges of shooting at U.S. soldiers while in detention in Afghanistan. The American prosecutor says that she could have used her knowledge of the United States to support terrorists trying to slip into the country and plot attacks. She is being held without bail.

Her sister Fauzia said last week that her sibling was innocent and accused U.S. forces of secretly holding her for the last five years.

“What a mockery that after five years in detention Aafia is suddenly discovered in Afghanistan,” her younger sister Fauzia Siddiqui, who is a medical doctor, told a news conference in Karachi. “I decided to break my silence to say that one is innocent until proven guilty. My sister is innocent. Aafia was tortured for five years until one day U.S. authorities announce that they have found her in Afghanistan, which shows how they abused their power and tortured an innocent woman without committing any crime.”

Dr.  Aafia, born in 1972, into a well-to-do family. She obtained a biology degree in the United States at MIT and later a doctorate from Brandeis University, in neurological science. She disappeared in 2003 after returning to Pakistan and then was added to the list of most dangerous Al-Qaeda suspects compiled by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation in 2004. She was also included in a list published by Amnesty International in June 2007 as someone for whom there was “evidence of secret detention by the United States and whose fate and whereabouts remain unknown.”

Several former prisoners including British Muslim Moazzam Begg, who was held at Bagram before being transferred to Guantanamo Bay in Cuba and later released, tell the story of prisoner number 650, the only woman at Bagram. Their accounts claimed that the detained woman cried all the time and appeared to have lost her sanity.

The Strange Case of Aafia Siddiqui

This matter is not going to go away for a variety of reasons.

• The Bush Administration calls her the world’s most dangerous terrorist

• It’s a fascinating and mysterious case.
• U.S. authorities say Aafia is a senior al Qaeda "facilitator".
• But she’s charged with assault and the attempted murder of American soldiers abroad – not with any act of terrorism.
• She disappeared suddenly on March 30th. 2003, shortly after leaving her parents’ home in a taxi, with her 3 children.
• Considerable misinformation about her has been surreptitiously leaked by U.S. officials, thus compounding the mystery and heightening speculation.
• No information about the taxi driver has been forthcoming. And no one knows for sure where her children are. (At the time that she vanished, one was a babe-in-arms).
• Her disappearance has since become a cause celebre in  Pakistan, where activists say the Musharraf government  arrested and secretly detained her in 2003 at the behest of the  United States.
• Popular speculation in Pakistan has it that the Musharraf government handed her over to American authorities, who rendered her to a notorious Afghan prison at their giant airbase at Bagram.

Background

Dr. Aafia, as she is known in Pakistan, studied for a year in Houston Texas, where her brother is a doctor.

She then took an undergraduate degree in biology at MIT in Boston.

After graduating from MIT she enrolled in a doctoral programme at Brandeis University, where she studied cognitive neuroscience — the study of human behaviour, — particularly in children. Unnamed FBI and CIA sources have told gullible journalists and amateur analysts that she is a microbiologist.

Aafia Siddiqui’s life after receiving her doctorate was affected by a series of circumstances, which – combined with her devotion to Islam – brought her to the attention of the FBI.

It all began after 9-11, when employees at  FleetBostonFinancial  bank, flagged what they felt was a 
suspicious pre-9/11 transaction. Aafia’s husband had made a  debit card purchase of night vision goggles and body armour  about 3 months before the attacks in New York.

This – naturally – raised suspicion at the FBI.

At least some of that suspicion stemmed from the couple’s tenuous connection to two Saudi nationals one of whom had financial dealings that in a post-9/11 world set off warning bells. Workers at Fleet reviewing past bank transactions reportedly  flagged as suspicious, some that occurred just months before the attacks.

In July 2001, two Saudi students, Abdullah Al Reshood and Hatem Al Dhahri, had taken over Khan and Siddiqui’s apartment lease when the couple decided to move. Around that time, Al Reshood received a $20,000 wire transfer from the Saudi government. (That raised more FBI suspicions). Those were later allayed, however because a Saudi official later explained that the $20,000 was sent by the Saudi government to Al Reshood to pay for medical treatment for his wife.

Despite the FBI suspicions, both Khan and his wife Aafia were released after questioning.

Shortly after that they both returned to Pakistan at the insistence of the husband.

Although the marriage was already in trouble, they made another attempt at establishing themselves in the U.S., but by August of 2002, the marriage had reached the breaking point 
and they again returned home. Shortly after that her husband divorced her.

Aafia returned once more to the U.S. on her own – for job interviews at a number of universities and hospitals. The FBI accuses her of opening a suspicious postal box at that time. Her family says the post box was to receive replies from potential employers. The FBI says it was to receive al Qaeda messages.

After completing the series of job interviews, Aafia returned home and lived at her Mother’s home until March 30 2003, when she left to visit another family member. 

She was not seen again until this year on July 17th, when U.S. authorities say she was arrested by Afghan police, while "loitering near a government building".

Her lawyers contend the U.S. explanation is an elaborate fabrication intended to justify past actions in the "war on terror".

There will be more to come.