FIVE YEARS OF MY LIFE -- AN INNOCENT MAN IN GUANTANAMO

Chapter 9:  GUANTANAMO BAY, CAMP ECHO

IN OCTOBER 2004, I WAS TRANSFERRED FROM CAMP 1 TO CAMP Echo -- I had been told it consisted entirely of solitary-confinement cells.

For all I knew, when the guards came and blindfolded me, they could have been about to fly me back to Germany or Turkey. I believe I was transported in a small, completely sealed bus. It felt as though I was in an air-raid shelter on wheels. Everything I touched was made of metal. I remember hoping that I wasn't being taken to Turkey.

After a ten-minute drive, the bus stopped and we got out. I couldn't hear any sounds coming from other prisoners, just the noise of a wooden door opening, then several metal ones. When they took off the blindfold, I saw I was in a cage just like the ones in Camps 1 and 2, only smaller and more solidly built, with a single toilet-sink unit like the ones found on ships. A camera was mounted behind Plexiglas on the ceiling. The walls were made of several layers of small chain-link fence, welded together so that not even a spider would be able to slip through and visit me. I could hardly see anything of the outside world. Directly in front of the cage were a table and a chair. An iron ring was in the floor. I saw a wall with an open door and then, a little way off, a second cage with a table and chair. I was totally isolated.

Later I found out that the Camp Echo contained a dozen small wooden houses with two cages each. I had no idea why I was there. Was this a new form of punishment? I had heard that several prisoners had disappeared after being taken to Camp Echo and no one knew whether they were still alive. The camp was designed so that the prisoners would never have to leave their own private cell-block. They could be interrogated directly in front of their cages, and each cell had its own tiny shower. Was this where I was going to have to spend the next few years?

The guards came three times a day to bring me my food-otherwise they were nowhere to be seen. Sometimes they skipped a meal. At night they no longer woke me up so frequently.

***

"Get up!"

"Why?"

"You've got a visit."

"A visit? Who would want to visit me?"

My curiosity was piqued. Surely, I thought, it was an interrogator who had been sent specially from Washington to "help" me. I couldn't wait to see what trick they'd try this time.

A portly man in his mid-thirties wearing a suit and glasses walked through the door. The guards shackled me to the iron ring and left us sitting alone at the table in front of my cage. The man was sweating profusely. His shirt was already soaked, and he fished a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped beads of the sweat from his brow.

"Hello."

The man removed his glasses and fiddled with them. He seemed nervous.

''I'm your attorney," he said in English.

"My attorney?" I had to laugh. "Is that a joke? You? An attorney?"

"I have a letter from your mother ..."

They must have lost their minds, I thought. But I wanted to find out what they were up to.

"Let me see ..."

It was indeed a letter from my mother. I recognized her handwriting immediately.

My dear son, it's me, your mother. I hope you're doing well. This man is Baher Azmy. You can trust him. He's your lawyer.

I couldn't believe my eyes. My first letter in three years! The first words I had had from my mother! She obviously hadn't been allowed to write any more than those few lines-otherwise the letter wouldn't have passed the military censors.

"Where did you get this?"

"I met your mother," the man said.

"Where?"

He told me that I had had a German attorney for years. He was my lawyer in the United States and would go to Germany to meet my family. He told me my mother had been to Turkey and Washington to help with my case.

In Washington?

That made me suspicious. Perhaps this man was an interrogator after all and was just using my mother's letter to gain my trust.

"How do I know that you're the lawyer in the letter?"

He removed a number of ID cards and documents from his pockets and briefcase and showed them to me. The name was the same on all of them.

"I am here to help you," he said.

"That's what they all say."

"Unfortunately the rules here are extremely strict. I have to write down everything you tell me and show it to them. And I can't come whenever I want. It's very difficult."

"Okay," I said. "Maybe you're a lawyer, maybe you're not. Documents can be faked. But I've got nothing to hide. I'll tell you whatever you want."

"I understand your skepticism," the man said.

The man who claimed to be my attorney showed me a brochure from a Turkish human-rights organization. In it were pictures of me, including a passport photo taken when I was seventeen or eighteen and still had short hair and no beard. There was also a picture of my mother in front of a big white building. The caption read: "Rabiye Kurnaz speaks to the American media in front of the Supreme Court Building in Washington." Another picture showed her crying. Underneath it were the words: ''Any of us could be in the hell of Guantanamo."

The brochure filled me with sadness, but my curiosity was stronger. I read how people were getting involved in my case. I studied the words on the brochure until I had learned them by heart. It said that the Turkish government had violated its own laws by refusing to get me out of here. I thought back about the two Turkish agents who had visited me and the charade they had put on. Further down in the brochure, it said that I was innocent. I could hardly believe it. There were people who thought I was innocent.

I realized that my mother had done everything in her power to save me. Even if she hadn't had any success yet, she knew where I was and that I was alive. That was the most important thing. I was gradually coming to believe that the man sitting across the table from me really was an attorney. They couldn't possibly have faked these pictures. But I was still going to have to watch what I said. He'd warned me, and the Americans were possibly listening in on our conversation. So I didn't tell him about being tortured. There was nothing he could do about that anyway.

"I only expect help from Allah," I told him. "But if Allah is willing, you will be the sebeb."

"The what?"

"The reason, the cause. The herald of my release."

Baher Azmy nodded, looking relieved.

"I have a suggestion," I said. "If you want to help me you can start right now."

"How?"

"The next time, bring some coffee. I haven't had any coffee in years. If you can do that, then we'll see. If you can't, you won't be able to get me freed anyway."

"I don't know if I can get you any coffee, but I'll try ..."

"With lots of sugar," I said.

This was my first private visit since I had been taken prisoner.

I grabbed the letter from my mother and balled it up in my hand. Back in my cage I hid it under my clothes so that it would be hidden from the camera. But they took it away from me that night when they searched my cell.

That night, my head was full of thoughts. Could I really trust this man? Could a brochure like that be faked? Had the pictures of my mother been manipulated? But I didn't have anything to hide. They should have come to see that after all these years.

***

The next morning my attorney brought me a paper cup of coffee and a hot apple tart. The packaging said McDonald's. I was amazed. Did the guards have their own McDonald's outside the camp? The lawyer fished several sugar packets out of his pants pocket. This guy has already earned his keep, I thought.

During later visits, he brought some newspaper clippings for me from the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the German news magazines Spiegel and Stern. They were all writing about my case. He also mentioned that there were floods in Asia and that Germany had a new currency, the euro.

I read every article greedily. Some of the news was already old, but for me everything was new. In Guantanamo we didn't get any information from the outside world. Suddenly I came across an article that mentioned me. There was my picture, the same one from the Turkish brochure, with the caption: "The Taliban from Bremen." The Taliban from Bremen? That made my blood boil. Did people in Germany really think I was a Taliban? I had told the German agents my whole story when they interrogated me. Had they not confirmed it and reported it? Azmy shrugged. He said he was surprised to hear that people from the German government had visited me. I decided not to get angry about what people wrote about me. I wanted to be free any more. That was the only thing that mattered.

"Where's the part about Selcuk?" I asked.

"Selcuk?"

"My friend from Bremen who wanted to come to Pakistan with me. Where's the part about him blowing himself up. I can't find that ..."

"Selcuk Bilgin blew himself up? Where did you get that idea?"

"He was a suicide bomber. I don't know where or why. The Americans told me during my hearing."

Again, Baher seemed amazed. He said there was no way Selcuk could be a suicide bomber. If a German or a Turkish resident of Germany had blown himself up, he would have known about it. The German and American press would have surely reported it.

I felt shattered. Why had the court claimed something like that?

Baher said that they might have confused Selcuk with someone else. It had to be a mistake.

"And Selcuk is the reason you're here?" he asked.

"Yes," I said. "And because I took food from the tablighis."

Baher shook his head and took some notes. For a while, neither of us spoke.

"Where is the prison courtyard?" he asked.

"Outside, in the cage."

"I didn't see it."

"What did you see?"

"Two camps. Metal containers. And then there was a small cage with a prisoner, in the middle of the camp."

"That is the prison courtyard," I said.

Baher got up, went to my cell and discreetly started examining it.

"This is how you've been living?"

I nodded.

"For all these years? I can't believe people would do this to their fellow human beings. How can you stand it? What did you do the whole time?"

"I waited."

***

Every day, for several days in a row, Baher Azmy visited me. Every time he came he brought newspaper clippings, which I read eagerly. One day he failed to arrive, and when he showed up the following day he was wearing different shoes. The guards had told him they couldn't let him in with his sandals because I might stomp on his feet and injure him. So he bought new shoes, sneakers. We had a good laugh about that. We got along well. Baher was born in Egypt and grew up in the United States. Only thirty-five years old, he was already teaching in law school. I told him everything he wanted to know, and he jotted down almost every word. Baher said he would write to me. He was going back and would try to get me released.· He couldn't promise anything, but by now I trusted him. He asked if he could relay a message to my family on my behalf. I dictated a few sentences for my mother, to the effect that I was doing fine. Then I signed a document, giving him power of attorney. Then he said goodbye and left.

Later I discovered that I was one of the first three Guantanamo prisoners who were allowed to be visited by an attorney. The other two prisoners were from England. I saw Azmy three more times in the camp. After my release, he told me that he actually tried to visit me four times but on one occasion he had been told by the guards that I had refused to see him.

***

Several days after Azmy had left, I was taken back to Camp 2.

"Hey, Murat, where have you been?" asked Salah.

"I had a visitor, my lawyer in America."

Several prisoners laughed.

"Nonsense," said Salah. "They're pulling wool over your eyes."

"He brought me some newspaper clippings," I said.

That got everyone's attention and I promised to tell them what had been going on in the world after our evening prayers.

When the generators were briefly shut off that night, important news was passed from camp to camp. The last prisoner in a block would yell as loudly as possible in the direction of the next man. If the last prisoner in Block Alpha shouted, the first one in Block Bravo could hear what he was saying. The news was then relayed within the block, and the next night it would be yelled over to the next block. It was a time-consuming process since the guards and the IRF team came immediately to punish the prisoner who had done the yelling. But news did get through.

One thing was clear. When I was finished telling my news, others would have to take over the job. I knew that in a few minutes I would be heading for solitary confinement.

I split the news into two categories: world news and news that directly concerned the camp. I had a lot to tell. There had been a war in Iraq, and the Americans had won, but people were dying every day there in a civil war. There was a new government in Afghanistan. Concerning Guantanamo, a U.S. judge had declared the military tribunals unconstitutional, and George Bush had responded by saying that we detainees were all dangerous murderers and could not be compared to other prisoners. I recalled an absurd image from one of Baher's newspaper clippings. It was a picture of an American politician posing with a meal: half a chicken, potatoes, salad, soup, a soft drink, and some ice cream. He looked very satisfied. In the accompanying article, he claimed that that was what we were being given to eat in Guantanamo every day. The caption read: "Is chicken torture?"

I could only shake my head. In all those years, I didn't see anything like chicken, even in my dreams. Goddamn lies! Some newspaper reports said we were being treated with the same respect for human rights as the prisoners in ordinary American jails. But other articles had reported that some people in America were taking up our cause and beginning to speculate about torture in Guantanamo.

To ensure that all my news would get passed on, I spoke English as fast as I could. Salah translated it into Arabic. It wasn't long before the guards were spraying me with tear gas. I covered my face with my hands, crawled into the corner of my cell and kept talking.

I was taken to Block India, where they turned off the air conditioner. It was the harshest punishment there was. I immediately lay on the floor to minimize the amount of air I needed. I knew that for the next month I would hardly be able to breathe. I can't remember much from that time, but from one interrogation, when at least I got some air, I do recall the following exchange.

"Do you know where you made your mistake?" the interrogator asked me.

"You tell me."

"You talked to the others about Jihad and tried to get them stirred up. We didn't know you were such a good speaker. About Jihad."

Utter nonsense.

"You know exactly what I was talking about," I said. "The blocks are all bugged."

"I heard you had a visit from your attorney."

"That's none of your business."

"You should be on your guard. Are you sure he's an attorney? I hope you didn't sign anything."

"I did."

"That's your decision. Do you know what you signed?"

"What?"

"You'll see."

***

Six weeks later I was taken back to Camp 2. The news I had given Salah had been relayed through all the blocks -- along with more information from the two prisoners from England who had been granted attorneys. We were connected with the world again! We knew what was happening outside Guantanamo! I have no idea how many prisoners had to pay for this achievement with time in the cooler.

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