Ex-Gitmo Detainee From Uruguay, to Brazil to Venezuela

Posted on July 28, 2016July 28, 2016 by Denise Simon

Ex-Guantánamo detainee who vanished from Uruguay turns up in Venezuela

Abu Wa’el Dhiab, who had disappeared last month in Uruguay where he and six others were resettled in 2014, showed up at the Syrian consulate in Caracas

Guardian: A resettled former Guantánamo prisoner who disappeared last month in Uruguay, setting off alarm bells in neighboring countries and recriminations in Washington, has reappeared in Venezuela.

The Uruguayan foreign minister, Rodolfo Nin Novoa, told the Associated Press that Syrian native Abu Wa’el Dhiab showed up at his country’s consulate in Caracas. Consulate officials refused to provide information or entry to AP journalists gathered outside.

Dhiab reportedly had last been seen in mid-July in Chuy, a small city on the Uruguay-Brazil border that is home to a small Arab community.

He is one of six former Guantánamo prisoners who were resettled in Uruguay after being released by US authorities in 2014, invited by then president José Mujica as a humanitarian gesture.

The men had been detained in 2002 for suspected ties to al-Qaida. They were held without charge like hundreds of others at Guantánamo Bay before the US government cleared them for release. There are no charges against Dhiab or order for his arrest, and Uruguayan officials had said that as a refugee he has the right to leave the South American country.

But Dhiab’s disappearance raised concerns, as well as questions about how closely countries that resettle former Guantánamo inmates should watch them and for how long, as the US prepares to release more prisoners.

US lawmakers trying to block Barack Obama from closing the detention center recently scolded his administration for losing track of Dhiab. The US envoy in Montevideo also expressed concerns about the lack of information on his whereabouts. Ambassador Kelly Keiderling said it’s up to Uruguay to say whether Dhiab can travel, though she added that she would prefer he stay in Uruguay. When questioned at a news conference, she said Dhiab “could be, yes, theoretically” a threat.

Colombia-based Avianca Airlines recently issued an internal alert saying Dhiab could be using a fake passport trying to enter Brazil, the site of the Summer Olympics. The airline said the alert was issued based on information provided by Brazil’s federal police, which had been looking for Dhiab.

The Uruguayan government has provided social services and financial support to Dhiab and the five other former detainees – three others from Syria, a Tunisian and a Palestinian. But the men have struggled to adjust and have complained about not getting enough help from Uruguayan officials.

Dhiab has been the most vocal about his unhappiness. Last year, he visited neighboring Argentina. In an orange jumpsuit like those Guantánamo prisoners have worn, he told news media in Buenos Aires that he planned to seek asylum for himself and the other detainees still held at the US naval base in eastern Cuba.

In an interview with the Uruguayan magazine Búsqueda, Dhiab said he was never a terrorist, but sympathizes with al-Qaida because of the torture that he endured in Guantánamo. He also has accused Uruguay of breaking its commitment to bring his family.

Jon Eisenberg, a US lawyer who represented Dhiab while he was detained at Guantánamo, said he has not been in contact with the former prisoner since a phone call in June but has heard from a contact in Uruguay that the report of his being in Venezuela is accurate.

Eisenberg said Dhiab was very concerned about his wife and three children, who fled the Syrian civil war for Turkey but then had to return to their homeland for financial reasons. They were in a Syrian village that was bombed by government forces in November 2015.

The lawyer said that when he last spoke with the former prisoner, Dhiab was hopeful that his family might be brought to Uruguay.

“That’s why I thought he wouldn’t leave Uruguay,” Eisenberg said.

Venezuela, Chaos in our Hemisphere, Inflation Skyrockets

Posted on July 12, 2016July 12, 2016 by Denise Simon

Venezuelans flee to Mexico to escape economic crisis

Kimberly-Clark: Venezuela seizes and re-opens US-owned factory

BBC: The government of Venezuela has said it has seized a factory owned by the US firm Kimberly-Clark.

The firm had said it was halting operations in Venezuela as it was unable to obtain raw materials.

But the labour minister said on Monday that the factory closure was illegal and it had re-opened “in the hands of the workers”.

Kimberly-Clark, which makes hygiene products including tissues and nappies, said it had acted appropriately.

Over the weekend it became the latest multinational to close or scale back operations in the country, citing strict currency controls, a lack of raw materials and soaring inflation.

Reuters: No to the closure” read graffiti on the firm’s gates over the weekend

General Mills, Procter & Gamble and other corporations have reduced operations in Venezuela as the country is gripped by economic crisis and widespread shortages of basic household goods.

What has gone wrong in Venezuela?

Labour Minister Oswaldo Vera, from the ruling Socialist Party (PSUV), visited the factory in Maracay and said it was illegal.

Almost 1,000 workers had asked him to re-start production, he said.

Mr Vera said: “Kimberly-Clark will continue producing, now in the hands of the workers.

“We’ve just turned on the first engine.”

The Texas-based company said in a statement: “If the Venezuelan government takes control of Kimberly-Clark facilities and operations, it will be responsible for the well-being of the workers and the physical asset, equipment and machinery in the facilities going forward.”

In just 12 hours, more than 35K Venezuelans cross Colombian border to buy food, medicine

FoxNewsLatino – Cucuta – In just 12 hours, more than 35,000 Venezuelans crossed the border into Colombia on Sunday to buy food and medicines in the city of Cucuta, when the Venezuelan government agreed to opened border crossings for one day only.

People began crossing the Simon Bolivar international bridge at 5:00 a.m. to purchase products that are scarce in Venezuela.

“We’re from here in San Antonio (and), honestly, we don’t have any food to give our children, so I don’t think it’s fair that the border is still closed,” a Venezuelan woman told EFE in Cucuta.

The woman, who preferred to not give her name, crossed the international bridge with her husband and children ages 5 and 2.

The border crossings between Tachira state and Norte de Santander province were closed on Aug. 19, 2015, by Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, who said he took the measure to fight smuggling and prevent members of paramilitary groups from entering Venezuela.

Maduro later ordered all crossings along the 1,378-mile border closed.

Tachira Gov. Jose Gregorio Vielma Mora said Saturday that the border would be opened on Maduro’s orders.

After the announcement, hundreds of Venezuelans began lining up to cross the Simon Bolivar international bridge.

“A second entry by Venezuelans into Colombia was planned by the Venezuelan right, with the pretext of buying food and medicines,” Vielma Mora said.

The governor was apparently referring to an incident last Tuesday, when about 500 Venezuelans from the city of Ureña crossed the closed Francisco de Paula Santander international bridge and went into Cucuta to buy food.

Norte de Santander Gov. William Villamizar, for his part, said in a Twitter post after visiting the border crossings that the humanitarian corridor “has benefited 25,000 people” who were able to buy “food and medicines.”

Villamizar spoke with some of the people streaming across the border and posed for photos with a family carrying a poster that read, “Colombia, gracias por su solidaridad con Venezuela” (Colombia, Thanks for Your Solidarity with Venezuela).

“This is super nice on Colombia’s part, very good,” Rosalba Jaimes, a San Antonio resident, told EFE.

Betty Rojas, a Venezuelan already heading home, said she and others planned to cross whenever the border was open.

“We bought rice, pasta, sugar, toilet paper, butter, everything we could bring back. We had enough for lots of stuff,” Rojas told EFE, adding that she wanted to tell the Colombian government “thank you.”

Cucuta police chief Col. Jaime Barrera said officers would “guarantee security in Cucuta’s business districts for the thousands of people coming from Venezuela.

Officers have been posted at the border crossings and at businesses across the border city, the provincial police chief said.

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos and Foreign Minister Maria Angela Holguin visited Cucuta on Wednesday.

The president said he would try to negotiate with Maduro in an effort to reopen the border crossings.

Venezuela: Decree Grants New Powers To President, Defense Minister

Stratfor: Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro issued a presidential decree July 11 granting new, sweeping powers to himself and Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez, Sumarium reported. Maduro said the decree establishes a new program that concentrates economic and political power at the very top of government, which will enable the country to correct its economic woes and get production back on track. Moreover, all government institutions and ministries in the country will now fall under the direct control of the president and the defense minister. The president said that he will provide more information about the decree, which effectively makes Padrino Lopez a second head of state in Venezuela, within the coming days.

Shhh, But 2 More Gitmo Detainees Transferred to Serbia

Posted on July 11, 2016July 11, 2016 by Denise Simon

July 11, 2016

The Department of Defense announced today the transfer of Muhammadi Davlatov and Mansur Ahmad Saad al-Dayfi from the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay to the Government of Serbia.

Related reading: Lawsuit petition against Barack Obama

76 Detainees remain at Gitmo

From left, Mansoor al Dayfi, a Yemeni, and Umar Abdulayev, a Tajik, who were taken to Guantánamo Bay from Afghanistan on the same day, Feb. 9, 2002 pose for the International Committee of the Red Cross in separate undated photos provided by their attorneys.

From left, Mansoor al Dayfi, a Yemeni, and Umar Abdulayev, a Tajik, who were taken to Guantánamo Bay from Afghanistan on the same day, Feb. 9, 2002 pose for the International Committee of the Red Cross in separate undated photos provided by their attorneys.

Spotted in Guantánamo’s stacks of books for the detainees: A copy of a Serbian-English dictionary and phrase book that looked and felt like it had never been cracked before it was pulled from a shelf on Saturday, July 9, 2016. The stamp says it was approved for the detainees on July 21, 2009.

Spotted in Guantánamo’s stacks of books for the detainees: A copy of a Serbian-English dictionary and phrase book that looked and felt like it had never been cracked before it was pulled from a shelf on Saturday, July 9, 2016. The stamp says it was approved for the detainees on July 21, 2009.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/guantanamo/article88852237.html#storylink=cpy

The weekend releases to Italy and Serbia raised to 30 the number of countries that have resettled detainees for the Obama administration.

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVY BASE, Cuba

MiamiHerald: The Pentagon said Monday it delivered two prisoners to Serbia, ending more than 14 years of detention without charges and wrapping up a weekend of releases that downsized the captive population to 76.

One, a Tajik known here as Umar Abdulayev, 37, had been cleared for release by both Bush and Obama administration review panels but resisted repatriation. In 2009 he announced through his lawyer that he was so fearful of return that he’d rather spend the rest of his life on this remote base in southeast Cuba.

The other, a Yemeni named Mansoor al Dayfi, in his mid 30s, was cleared for release by the inter-agency review panel in October. From 2010, he had been held as a “forever prisoner,” a captive considered too dangerous to release but ineligible for trial until the board downgraded his dangerousness.

It was the second Defense Department transfer disclosure in 20 hours. Earlier, the Pentagon said that a Yemeni was being resettled in Italy. Neither Italy nor Serbia had offered sanctuary to a Guantánamo prisoner before. Now, 27 of the last 76 captives are approved for transfer with security assurances that satisfy Secretary of Defense Ash Carter.

A Pentagon statement called Abdulayev by a different name, Muhammadi Davlatov. He was the last Tajik in the prison of now 14 nationalities and left the base with the other two before dawn Saturday.

“I’m delighted for him. It took way too long but it’s an enormous victory that he would get out of Guantánamo and he wouldn’t go to Tajikistan,” said Chicago attorney Matthew J. O’Hara, who seven years ago disclosed that Abdulayev feared repatriation more than spending the rest of his life in a Guantánamo cell.

Part of it was the stigma of having been at Guantánamo, he said. Part of it was fears that his family came out on the wrong side of that nation’s civil war.

Instead, O’Hara said the 37-year-old man who sports a long black ponytail wants to forge a career as a linguist or translator using the Arabic and English he learned in prison and the Tajik and Russian he learned before fleeing his homeland in 2001. He doesn’t speak Serbian but his attorney said “he’s a sponge” in his ability to pick up languages.

He also wants to marry and have children, he said.

Leaked prison records indicate that U.S. troops brought both men to the crude open-air prison compound called Camp X-Ray on Feb. 9, 2002, the eighth shipment of captives from Afghanistan. In all, 34 men were brought to Guantánamo that day to raise the total of war-on-terror captives to 220. Read more here

Another Gitmo Detainee Released to Italy

Posted on July 10, 2016July 10, 2016 by Denise Simon

So, while Obama is finishing his trip to Poland and Spain and the homeland is under attack by Black Lives Matter and The New Black Panthers and we mourn the death of law enforcement…the Department of Defense was busy otherwise.

They released Fayiz Ahmad Yahia Suleiman to Italy.

Captured at Arab Brigade on the front lines in Afghanistan. Detainee received basic militant training at al-Qaida’s al-Faruq Training Camp and advanced training in poisons at al-Qaida’s Tarnak Farm Training Camp. Detainee is reported to be a veteran of the Bosnian Jihad and a close associate of former Bosnian commander and al-Qaida operative Abu Zubayr al-Haili. JTFGTMO determined this detainee to be:

A HIGH risk, as he is likely to pose a threat to the US, its interests, and allies
A HIGH threat from a detention perspective
Of HIGH intelligence value

Read his full jacket and history here.

As directed by the president’s Jan. 22, 2009, executive order, the interagency Guantanamo Review Task Force conducted a comprehensive review of this case. As a result of that review, which examined a number of factors, including security issues, Suleiman was unanimously approved for transfer by the six departments and agencies comprising the task force.

In accordance with statutory requirements, the secretary of defense informed Congress of the United States’ intent to transfer this individual and of the secretary’s determination that this transfer meets the statutory standard.

The United States is grateful to the Government of Italy for its humanitarian gesture and willingness to support ongoing U.S. efforts to close the Guantanamo Bay detention facility. The United States coordinated with the Government of Italy to ensure this transfer took place consistent with appropriate security and humane treatment measures.

Today, 78 detainees remain at Guantanamo Bay.

So who is Fayiz Ahmad Yahia Suleiman?

Fayiz Ahmad Yahia Suleiman is a citizen of Yemen currently held in the Guantanamo Bay detention camps, in Cuba after being classified as an enemy combatant by the United States‘s.^[1] American intelligence analysts estimate Suleiman was born in 1974 in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia and the Department of Defense assigned him the Internment Serial Number 153.

As of September 2010 Fayiz Ahmad Yahia Suleiman has been confined in the Guantanamo detention camps without charge for eight years eight months.^[2]

A Summary of Evidence memo was prepared for Fayiz Ahmad Yahia Suleiman’s Combatant Status Review Tribunal, on October 12, 2004.^[3]^[4] The memo listed the following allegations against him:

a. The detainee is associated with al Qaida and the Taliban:

Originally from Jeddah, Saudi Arabia,^[5] the detainee traveled to Jalalabad, Afghanistan via Hudaida, Yemen; Sana Yemen; Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Karachi , Pakistan; Quetta, Pakistan; and Kabul, Afghanistan.

The detainee worked for a suspected al Qaida operative in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

The detainee trained in Khandahar, Afghanistan to make poisons.

Two of the detainee’s aliases are listed in a document recovered from a safehouse raid associated with suspected al Qaida members in Karachi, Pakistan.

b. The detainee participated in military operations against the United States and its coalition partners:

The detainee was a member of an Arab fighting group against the Northern Alliance in Talaqoun.

The detainee was a nurse at Talaquon while fighting the Northern Alliance and was at Tora Bora before trying to cross the border into Pakistan.

The detainee was arrested in December 2001, by Pakistani authorities attempting to cross the border from Afghanistan with other Arabs.

First annual Administrative Review Board

A Summary of Evidence memo was prepared for Fayiz Ahmad Yahia Suleiman’s first annual Administrative Review Board, on 27 May 2005.^[7] The memo listed factors for and against his continued detention.

There is no record that Fayiz Ahmad Yahia Suleiman participated in this Board hearing.

Second annual Administrative Review Board

A Summary of Evidence memo was prepared for Fayiz Ahmad Yahia Suleiman’s second annual Administrative Review Board, on 8 August 2006.^[8] The memo listed factors for and against his continued detention.

There is no record that Fayiz Ahmad Yahia Suleiman participated in this Board hearing.

References

↑ list of prisoners (.pdf), US Department of Defense, May 15, 2006

↑ Fayiz Ahmad Yahia Suleiman – The Guantánamo Docket [1] The New York Times

↑ Summary of Evidence for Combatant Status Review Tribunal — Suleiman, Fayiz Ahmad Yahia [2] OARDEC October 12, 2004

↑ OARDEC (October 12, 2004). “Summary of Evidence for Combatant Status Review Tribunal — Suleiman, Fayiz Ahmad Yahia”. United States Department of Defense. pp. pages 53–54. http://www.dod.mil/pubs/foi/detainees/csrt_arb/000101-000200.pdf#53. Retrieved 2007-12-04.

↑ When this memo was first released in March 2005 “Jeddah, Saudi Arabia” was redacted.

↑ Review process unprecedented [3] Spc Timothy Book March 10, 2006

↑ OARDEC (27 May 2005). “Unclassified Summary of Evidence for Administrative Review Board in the case of Suleiman, Fayiz Ahmad Yahia”. United States Department of Defense. pp. pages 77–78. http://www.dod.mil/pubs/foi/detainees/csrt_arb/ARB_Round_1_Factors_000099-000196.pdf#77. Retrieved 2007-12-04.

↑ OARDEC (8 August 2006). “Unclassified Summary of Evidence for Administrative Review Board in the case of”. United States Department of Defense. pp. pages 26–28. http://www.dod.mil/pubs/foi/detainees/csrt_arb/ARB_Round_2_Factors_200-298.pdf#26. Retrieved 2007-12-04.

POTUS/ Kerry Deal with FARC Failing?

Posted on July 8, 2016July 8, 2016 by Denise Simon

As with perhaps the Iranian JPOA deal, this too will fail, even with that baseball game?

HAVANA (Reuters) – Colombia’s leftist FARC rebel leader and U.S. President Barack Obama attended the same baseball game in Cuba on Tuesday, underscoring a message of regional cooperation that Obama took on his historic visit to the Communist-led country.

FARC negotiator Pastor Alape confirmed the attendance of a contingent of 40 members and said the game between the Tampa Bay Rays and a Cuban team was a “symbol of peace.” A Reuters reporter also saw the rebels, who are in Havana for peace talks with the Colombian government. More here from Reuters.

WSJ: The current negotiations do not ensure genuine accountability for FARC members responsible for war crimes and human-rights violations; and that those guilty of kidnapping, murder, forced abortions, armed displacement, indiscriminate attacks on innocent women and children or drug trafficking will be appropriately punished. On the contrary, the so-called peace agreement will serve as a thick mantle of impunity.

The agreements with FARC are clever in the way they disguise impunity. While there will be investigations, trials and sentences for human-rights violations, those who plead guilty will in every case be exempted from prison time. The agreement explicitly grants convicted—and confessed—human-rights violators the right to run for public office, a right that the Colombian Constitution expressly withholds from convicted felons. Think of what will happen: FARC kingpins who ordered massacres, kidnappings, child-soldier recruitment and extortions, will now run for mayors and governors of the regions they victimized.

The agreements also grant total amnesty for drug trafficking. By being labeled a “political crime,” drug trafficking becomes eligible for executive amnesty. There will be no prison in Colombia or extradition to the U.S. for those running the world’s largest cocaine cartel.

To make things worse, the agreement includes no demand for FARC to surrender the billions of dollars worth of illegal assets that it has amassed through the drug traffic. Colombian and American taxpayers—the latter through U.S. foreign aid to Colombia—will carry the entire burden of economic reparations for FARC’s victims.

FARC’s vast illegal fortune will doubtless be used to advance its “political” agenda after it “transitions” into becoming a political party. Given the size of its ill-gotten treasury, FARC will become the wealthiest political organization in the country by far, which will seriously imperil the stability of Colombian democracy.

John Kerry FARC meeting Cuba This photo, posted on Twitter by a member of the FARC delegation in Cuba, shows US Secretary of State John Kerry meeting with FARC peace negotiators.Pastor Alape/FARC

BusinessInsider: Amid the fanfare surrounding President Barack Obama’s landmark visit to Cuba on Monday, a different US diplomatic achievement took place.

As Obama toured Havana, Secretary of State John Kerry sat down for a meeting with members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), a left-wing rebel group that has fought Colombian forces and paramilitaries for more than 50 years.

The meeting was the first one between a US secretary of state and the FARC since the rebels were designated a terrorist group by the US in 1997.

US Secretary of State John Kerry and US Special Envoy for the Colombian Peace Process Bernard Aronson, far left, meet with members of the Colombian government team holding peace talks with rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, FARC, in Havana, March 21, 2016.Colombia’s Peace Commissioner via AP

Even if Colombian and FARC negotiators conclude a peace deal, removal from the terror list could take some time. The United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, a right-wing paramilitary group with extensive ties to Colombian politicians and responsible for many rights abuses, weren’t removed from the list until 2014 — eight years after they officially demobilized.

Other issues remain before a deal is finished. In March, the Colombian congress gave the government power to set up demobilization zones, where government officials won’t be able arrest FARC members.

*****

A FARC Splinter Group Has Pulled Out of the Colombian Ceasefire Agreement

Time: A splinter group of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) rebel front said on Wednesday it will not participate in a ceasefire agreement with the government, potentially derailing a resolution to nearly five decades of violent internal conflict in the South American nation.

In a statement, the Armando Rios First Front — a 200-member division of FARC — said it will not lay down arms and will continue its battle against the administration of President Juan Manuel Santos, according to Reuters.

“We have decided not to demobilize, we will continue the fight for the taking of power by the people for the people, independent of the decision taken by the rest of the members of the organization,” the statement said.

The peace deal was announced two weeks ago following more than three years of dialogue between the two sides.

The splinter group said it was calling on other FARC groups to pull out of the deal as well, reports Reuters.