April, 15 2015, 08:30am EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Reprieve’s press office in the UK: +44 207 553 8140, or Shahzad Akbar in Pakistan: +92 312 505 5971
Family of 'Emaciated' Guantanamo Prisoner Plead in Court for Help
WASHINGTON
The family of a hunger-striking Pakistani man detained in Guantanamo Bay has today filed an emergency application with the Islamabad High Court, demanding that the Pakistani government intervene immediately in his case.
Ahmad Rabbani has been on hunger strike for more than two years in protest at his detention without charge or trial in Guantanamo, where he has been held since 2004. An affidavit submitted to the court by human rights organization Reprieve, whose staff recently visited Mr Rabbani, describes the damaging effect on his health of his brutal treatment at the prison - including daily force-feedings and 'forced cell extractions' (FCEs).
Mr Rabbani has told his lawyers at Reprieve that his weight has dropped to approximately 40kg, and that he regularly vomits and experiences numbness in his limbs, dizziness and fainting. Mr Rabbani described how his thigh has wasted away to the width of his calf. His lawyers describe him as looking "emaciated" during their latest visit.
The urgent court application demands that the Pakistani government intervene immediately with the U.S. authorities to arrange for the release and repatriation of Mr Rabbani before he either dies or suffers permanent damage to his health. Filed today, the petition is likely to be heard tomorrow (Thurs) in the Court.
The court has previously heard how Mr Rabbani's constitutional rights to legal defence, fair trial, and humane treatment have all been gravely abused by his detention without charge or trial by the United States - violations which, Mr Rabbani's lawyers argue, oblige the Pakistani government to take up his case.
Mr Rabbani's lawyers have also submitted to the court a copy of the US Senate's recent report into CIA torture, which reveals that his 2002 arrest was a case of mistaken identity. The 2014 report also confirms that Mr Rabbani was initially detained for 540 days in secret CIA jails before his transfer to Guantanamo, and was subjected to a number of violent interrogation methods that have been condemned as torture.
Commenting, Mr Rabbani's lawyer Alka Pradhan, US Counsel at Reprieve, said: "The US Senate report confirmed that Ahmed Rabbani was the wrong man in the wrong place at the wrong time 13 years ago - and that he was horribly tortured in US secret prisons. But he remains in Guantanamo - and after years of abuse, he is now dangerously ill. Ahmad's hunger strike is a last desperate cry for help from the Pakistani government. They must now intervene in his case and bring him home."
Reprieve is a UK-based human rights organization that uses the law to enforce the human rights of prisoners, from death row to Guantanamo Bay.
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