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From America’s Guantánamo to Saudi Arabia’s Guillotine
Many former detainees who have been repatriated to their home country or resettled in a third country have found themselves in either another prison or in what we call Guantánamo 2.0.
Jan 01, 2024
Shortly after the U.S. repatriated the cleared prisoner and Saudi engineer Ghassan Abdullah al-Sharbi to his home country, he disappeared, adding to the growing list of men who, once released from Guantánamo, walk into conditions much worse, including execution. Attempts to find these men are met with silence from the U.S. and the implicated countries. Why?
When given the opportunity to be transferred out of Guantánamo, it’s hard to think of any reason why any incarcerated person would want to stay. That is, unless they were going to be sent somewhere that likely could be or would be worse than the U.S.’ infamous offshore prison. This past March, Ghassan al-Sharbi, a Saudi engineer who was detained at Guantánamo for over two decades without trial, was transferred to his home country. Instead of being cause for celebration however, al-Sharbi feared for his life and shared his fears with a fellow prisoner with whom he was departing to Saudi Arabia.
Despite the fact that al-Sharbi cited threats from the Saudi delegation that had met with him in Guantánamo, and previously informed the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the State Department that he did not want to return to his home country for safety reasons, his transfer back to Saudi Arabia was nevertheless authorized by Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin in September, following extensive diplomatic efforts by the Biden administration.
Those of us who remained in Guantánamo while our brothers were released heard shocking stories about their predicaments.
The Pentagon’s statement announcing al-Sharbi’s transfer home expressed gratitude to Saudi Arabia and other nations for their assistance in reducing the detainee population at Guantánamo Bay. The statement also said in part that “...in consultation with our partners in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, we completed the requirements for responsible transfer.” Of course, “responsible,” was left undefined and notably absent from the statement, as well as any mention of how al-Sharbi’s safety and rights as an ex-prisoner innocent of all charges would be assured or the exact circumstances surrounding his repatriation.
Upon being transferred, al-Sharbi was reportedly sick and on a hunger strike in protest of forced repatriation. According to a Guantánamo source, al-Sharbi allegedly cut his veins, resulting in significant bleeding that necessitated hospitalization. The act was purportedly driven by his apprehension of facing torture and execution in Saudi Arabia.
Unfortunately, as it turned out, al-Sharbi’s apprehensions about his safety in Saudi Arabia were not unfounded. In fact, since he was transferred to Saudi Arabia, he has effectively disappeared and no one including his family or his lawyer Sabrina Shroff—who expressed deep concerns prior to his repatriation—have been able to contact him, let alone receive any information about his well-being.
In correspondence with Shroff, the State Department exhibited a total disregard for al-Sharbi’s condition or whereabouts; Shroff stated that they “had been most unhelpful. Their response consists of a bunch of words—like the ones you read in a Hallmark card. Bunch of platitudes with zero information. No information as to his whereabouts in Saudi.” Given the almost complete and total disregard for the men’s fate, the State Department’s response is not surprising. However, it doesn’t make them any less accountable for being bystanders to Saudi violence.
Confess, and You’re ‘Cured’: Saudi’s ‘Rehabilitation’ Process
The story of al-Sharbi’s ordeal began in the early 2000s when he was accused of being part of a group captured in Pakistan that was allegedly manufacturing explosive devices intended for use against U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan.
He was charged with “providing material support for terrorism.” Higher courts ruled that this charge was not recognized as an international war crime at the time of his alleged actions, which led to the case being dropped. Nevertheless, he was subjected to years of indefinite detention and suffered egregious human rights abuses including torture, including extreme sleep deprivation, isolation, and sexual abuse. He spent over a decade on hunger strikes protesting his imprisonment, and because of this he was subjected to force feeding, with serious physical health and psychological problems.
Instead of al-Sharbi receiving any adequate care or treatment for the abuse he has suffered, like other Guantánamo survivors transferred to Saudi Arabia, he will likely be sent to a transitional rehabilitation center. There is little that is transparent about the rehabilitation center and how it operates; however, the center’s precondition for release is an admission of guilt. This injustice raises the potential for coerced confessions.
While the repatriation of Ghassan Abdullah al-Sharbi is a stark reminder of the long-lasting consequences of the United States’ abysmal record at Guantánamo Bay, it raises urgent questions about the treatment of former prisoners upon release; the lack of accountability for human rights abuses not only at Guantánamo, but also afterwards; and the need for transparency in the repatriation process.
Execution: Why Saudi Arabia Is Especially Dangerous
In addition to the disappearance of Ghassan Abdullah al-Sharbi, three other former Guantánamo prisoners were transferred to Saudi Arabia only to be detained once arriving. For example Mohammed al Qahtani was repatriated to Saudi Arabia almost exactly a year before al-Sharbi, on March 6, 2022, only to be disappeared upon his return home. In addition, Zayed al-Hussain (also known as Zaid al-Ghamdy), who was repatriated in 2007, and Mohammad al-Shumrani, who was repatriated in 2015, have both disappeared.
Al-Hussain was sentenced to 23 years in prison for refusing to shake hands with former Crown Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, and under the present Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, he has been sentenced to death by execution.
Al-Shumrani was sentenced shortly after his release to Saudi Arabia to eight years in detention for criticizing a judge at the court and for challenging the Saudi monarchy to a public debate. The Saudi prosecutor in charge of his case is seeking the death penalty, and a confidential source indicated that it is highly likely that al-Shumrani will in fact be executed.
According to an in-depth report on over 1,000 executions carried out in the kingdom since Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman assumed power in 2015, the death penalty in Saudi Arabia has almost doubled. This year alone, Saudi Arabia has executed over 100 people. These numbers make the fate of the men even more worrisome—not to mention that the Saudi Embassy in Washington and the Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs have not responded to any questions about these men.
Life After Guantánamo
Despite the fact that the transfer out of Guantánamo was supposed to offer survivors some reprieve from the abuse at the prison, many of those who have been repatriated to their home country or resettled in a third country have found themselves in either another prison or in what we call Guantánamo 2.0. Those of us who remained in Guantánamo while our brothers were released heard shocking stories about their predicaments. This includes Uyghur prisoners being released to a refugee camp in Albania and having their beards forcibly shaved by the Albanian police; a prisoner who was resettled in Slovakia and beaten by police so severely he had to be hospitalized; and many former prisoners who have simply disappeared in prisons where they were abused, tortured, and killed..
One of the most shocking cases was the death of a man I knew and lived with for years in Guantánamo—the Arabic poet Asim al-Khalaqi, who was released to Kazakhstan in 2014. The Kazakh government has a long history of mistreating men released from Guantánamo, and survivors have no legal rights and are effectively under house arrest.
Al-Khalaqi had dreams to raise his family and publish his book of poetry, which he wrote in Guantánamo. But we heard he had suddenly died a few months after his release. The Kazakh government denied mistreating al-Khalaqi then and subsequently denied him medical care. When he fell ill, his family was not allowed to visit him. Moreover, aside from being denied visitations, his family was prevented from attending his funeral and receiving his body. With the utmost cruelty, the Kazakh secret service buried al-Khalaqi in a location that is unknown to this day.
Facing State Terror in the UAE and Algeria
Life after Guantánamo is filled with even more harrowing cases, including the stories of several men who were released to the UAE (in 2015, 16, and 17) as part of a resettlement agreement. These men—four Afghans, 18 Yemenis, and one Russian—found themselves in conditions they described as worse than Guantánamo because they were suffering brutal abuse at the hand of the UAE’s prison guards. While the Afghanis and Yemenis were eventually transferred back to their home countries, with some facing imprisonment again, Russian survivor Ravil Mingazov remains in solitary confinement.
“He is under constant harassment and abuse by the UAE prison guards,” a released prisoner stated in a text message when I asked about Mingazov. Last month Cage launched a campaign to highlight his ordeal and to push for his release. My attempts to reach the Embassy of the UAE in Washington and the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs for comment have been met with silence.
Rather than exhibiting any care or taking precautions for the well-being, safety, and security of survivors of Guantánamo, the U.S. State Department has continued to repatriate and send former prisoners to their home countries and third-party countries where they are denied basic rights as citizens and human beings.
The most recently released prisoner from Guantánamo, Saeed Bakhouch, was repatriated to Algeria in late April after 21 years of detention without charge. I have been tracking and working for his release since his repatriation. While his lawyer was assured by the State Department that he would be treated humanely, Bakhouch was subjected to intense interrogation by the Algerian secret service. He was denied legal representation and was deprived of his medicine as a way of pressuring him to confess to a false accusation of being linked to al Qaeda in order to prosecute him. Absurdly, he was charged with “swearing allegiance to Osama bin Laden,” a man he had never met, and he had never set foot in Afghanistan.
All our attempts to reach out to the State Department, the Algerian Embassy in Washington, and the Algerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs about Bakhouch’s case have been ignored.
Bakhouch was eventually released last October on parole awaiting a trial; his release came after the intervention of the U.N. rapporteur to Guantánamo Fionnuala Ní Aoláin
In the midst of this official silence, a few of us working to trace and try to assist released prisoners from Guantánamo to secure their rights are left to return to the U.S. State Department, who authorized these repatriations in the first place.
The Disposability Politics of the U.S.’ Repatriation Program?
Rather than exhibiting any care or taking precautions for the well-being, safety, and security of survivors of Guantánamo, the U.S. State Department has continued to repatriate and send former prisoners to their home countries and third-party countries where they are denied basic rights as citizens and human beings. Moreover, the State Department has done nothing to track these cases. While lawyers, NGOs, and activists attempt to contact the State Department, they are often told that the U.S. government can’t intervene in how other countries treat former prisoners. However, in most cases the department does not even respond.
That’s why we will keep appealing to the U.S. government to:
- Stop sending cleared prisoners to countries where they will face further imprisonment, torture, and even death;
- Step in and reevaluate cases where abuse has occurred, and relocate the men who are still in prison and live in a legal limbo;
- Monitor the released prisoners and work with the hosting countries to ensure the released are treated humanely;
- Take practical steps to ensure that these men are treated humanely and left to try to rebuild their lives; and
- Offer support to the released individuals to assist them in their journey towards rebuilding their lives.
This is the least the U.S. can do to attempt to repair the insidious legacy of Guantánamo.
Guantánamo is approaching its 22nd anniversary, and despite the passage of time, 30 individuals remain imprisoned in the military prison in the U.S. naval base in Guantánamo. Among them, 16 have been granted clearance for release but are still in a state of uncertainty.
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China’s Highly Effective Global Dominance Is Intensifying the Death Economy
Jan 15, 2023
After publishing the first two editions of the Confessions of an Economic Hit Man trilogy, I was invited to speak at global summits. I met with heads of state and their top advisors from many countries. Two particularly significant venues were conferences in the summer of 2017 in Russia and Kazakhstan, where I joined an array of speakers that included major corporate CEOs, government and NGO heads such as UN Secretary-General António Guterres, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and (before he invaded Ukraine) Russian President Vladimir Putin. I was asked to speak on the need to end an unsustainable economic system that’s consuming and polluting itself into extinction — a Death Economy — and replace it with a regenerative one that was beginning to evolve — a Life Economy.
When I left for that trip, I felt encouraged. But something else happened.
In talking with leaders who had been involved in the development of China’s New Silk Road (officially, the Belt and Road Initiative, or BRI), I learned that an innovative, potent, and dangerous strategy was being implemented by China’s economic hit men (EHMs). It began to seem impossible to stop a country that in a few decades had pulled itself from the ashes of Mao’s Cultural Revolution to become a dominant world power and a major contributor to the Death Economy.
During my time as an economic hit man in the 1970s, I learned that two of the most important tools of the US EHM strategy are:
- Divide and conquer, and
- Neoliberal economics.
US EHMs maintain that the world is divided into the good guys (America and its allies) and the bad guys (the Soviet Union/Russia, China, and other Communist nations), and we try to convince people around the world that if they don’t accept neoliberal economics they’ll be doomed to remain “undeveloped” and impoverished forever.
Neoliberal policies include austerity programs that cut taxes for the rich and wages and social services for everyone else, reduce government regulations, and privatize public-sector businesses and sell them to foreign (US) investors — all of which support “free” markets that favor transnational corporations. Neoliberal advocates promote the perception that money will “trickle down” from the corporations and elites to the rest of the population. However, in truth, these policies almost always cause greater inequality.
Although the US EHM strategy has been successful in the short term at helping corporations control resources and markets in many countries, its failures have become increasingly obvious. America’s wars in the Middle East (while neglecting much of the rest of the world), the tendency of one Washington administration to break agreements made by previous ones, the inability of Republicans and Democrats to compromise, the wanton destruction of environments, and the exploitation of resources create doubts and often cause resentment.
China has been quick to take advantage.
Xi Jinping became president of China in 2013 and immediately began campaigning in Africa and Latin America. He and his EHMs emphasized that by rejecting neoliberalism and developing its own model, China had accomplished the seemingly impossible. It had experienced an average annual economic growth rate of nearly 10 percent for three decades and elevated more than 700 million people out of extreme poverty. No other country had ever done anything even remotely approaching this. China presented itself as a model for rapid economic success at home and it made major modifications to the EHM strategy abroad.
In addition to rejecting neoliberalism, China promoted the perception that it was ending the divide-and-conquer tactic. The New Silk Road was cast as a vehicle for uniting the world in a trading network that, it claimed, would end global poverty. Latin American and African countries were told that, through Chinese-built ports, highways, and railroads, they would be connected to countries on every continent. This was a significant departure from the bilateralism of colonial powers and the US EHM strategy.
Whatever one thinks of China, whatever its real intent, and despite recent setbacks, it’s impossible not to recognize that China’s domestic successes and its modifications to the EHM strategy impress much of the world.
However, there’s a downside. The New Silk Road may be uniting countries that were once divided, but it’s doing so under China’s autocratic government — one that suppresses self-evaluation and criticism. Recent events have reminded the world about the dangers of such a government.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine offers an example of how a tyrannical administration can suddenly alter the course of history.
It’s important to keep in mind that rhetoric around China’s modifications to the EHM strategy disguises the fact that China is using the same basic tactics as those employed by the US. Regardless of who implements this strategy, it’s exploiting resources, expanding inequality, burying countries in debt, harming all but a few elites, causing climate change, and worsening other crises that threaten our planet. In other words, it’s promoting a Death Economy that’s killing us.
The EHM strategy, whether implemented by the US or China, must end. It’s time to replace the Death Economy based on short-term profits for the few with a Life Economy that’s based on long-term benefits for all people and nature.
Taking action to usher in a Life Economy requires:
- Promoting economic activities that pay people to clean up pollution, regenerate destroyed environments, recycle, and develop technologies that do not ravage the planet;
- Supporting businesses that do the above. As consumers, workers, owners and/or managers, each of us can promote the Life Economy;
- Recognizing that all people have the same needs of clean air and water, productive soils, good nutrition, adequate housing, community, and love. Despite the efforts of governments to convince us otherwise, there’s no “them” and “us;” we’re all in this together;
- Ignoring and, when appropriate, denouncing propaganda and conspiracy theories aimed at dividing us from other countries, races, and cultures; and
- Realizing that the enemy is not another country, but rather the perceptions, actions, and institutions that support an EHM strategy and a Death Economy.
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'I Want My Wings Back': Mexican Trans Activist Hopes Biden Policies Bode Well for US Return
"I feel like the times are changing," says Lorena Amor Barajas, an LGBTQ+ advocate denied entry to the U.S. during the Trump administration. "I really hope it's true."
Sep 15, 2022
A Mexican transgender activist and pageant winner denied a U.S. visa to participate in San Francisco's Pride parade during former President Donald Trump's transphobic tenure is hopeful that policy changes implemented by the Biden administration will allow her to return to the United States, a country she once called home.
"Many Latino trans people live in the U.S. I want to show them my life, to give them an example of what they can do in their lives if they want it."
After four years of overt hostility toward the queer community--and especially transgender people--during the Trump era, and amid mounting attacks on trans rights in Republican-controlled states, the Biden administration quickly moved to restore and expand LGBTQ+ rights.
In language unimaginable until recently, President Joe Biden celebrated this year's Transgender Day of Visibility by hailing the "achievements and resiliency" of the trans community, praising its "generations of struggle, activism, and courage" and vowing a commitment to "fulfilling the promise of America for all Americans by stamping out discrimination and delivering freedom and equality for all."
Trans activists around the world have taken notice of the White House's new tone.
"I feel like the times are changing," Lorena Amor Barajas, a pioneering LGBTQ+ rights advocate and reigning Miss Trans Global Mexico, told Common Dreams in a weekend phone interview. "I really hope it's true."
In the spring of 2019, Barajas, then recently crowned Miss Trans Jalisco, was invited to participate in San Francisco Pride, marching in the parade and mentoring transgender Latinx youth.
"I was only going to stay three days in San Francisco," she explained, sharing a glowing letter of recommendation from Jalisco's state tourism director that cited her activism and the achievement of being the first transgender member of Mexico's National Chamber of Commerce.
With her home city of Puerto Vallarta and San Francisco--both known for their dynamic queer populations--being newly twinned sister cities, Barajas, who has nearly a million social media followers and hosts a popular late-night LGBTQ+ television talk show, was selected as an emissary to represent both her hometown and its LGBTQ+ community at SF Pride 2019. The Jalisco tourism bureau paid her airfare, accommodation, and other expenses and sent her on her way to Guadalajara for what she thought would be an easy visa approval.
There was very little risk of Barajas remaining in the United States. In addition to her activism and her burgeoning modeling career, she is also a renowned hairstylist who owns a successful salon in tony Marina Vallarta. She was sure she would get her visa.
But after Barajas placed her finger on a biometric scanner at the U.S. consulate, the young officer questioned why the name on his computer screen did not match the one on her identification documents. She explained that she successfully fought to become one of the first trans people in Mexico to legally amend their identification to match their gender identity.
"He said, 'You're a man, not a woman.' He called me Antonio, my old name. He said I was not fit to travel to the United States."
"He didn't believe me," she said. "He said, 'You're a man, not a woman.' He called me Antonio, my old name. He said I was not fit to travel to the United States."
"I was so excited for an amazing experience in my life, but they cut my wings," lamented Barajas. "I lost so many opportunities, not only for my career, but for the young trans people I want to help, for all the amazing activists in the LGBT community."
Barajas' denial came as the Trump administration waged what the Human Rights Campaign called "a reign of hate" against LGBTQ+ people.
From banning trans people from serving in the military to stripping trans workers, students, patients, unhoused people, prisoners, and others of their civil rights, Trump's war on gender-nonconforming people culminated in a bid to literally define transgender people out of existence by narrowly defining gender as a fixed biological condition determined by a person's genitals at birth. The administration even tried to export its bigotry abroad by removing the word "gender" from United Nations human rights documents.
After being denied a U.S. visa, Barajas focused on her activism and growing her business and modeling career. Last year, she was selected from a pool of 50 nationwide contestants to represent Mexico in the Miss Trans Global pageant in the United Kingdom.
"I had no trouble getting into the country," she said.
Robyn McCutcheon, who was the first openly transgender career U.S. foreign service officer, told Common Dreams that discriminatory visa denials happened "fairly often" during the Trump era.
"It does not surprise me at all, but it saddens me greatly," McCutcheon--who transitioned while serving in Romania during the supportive Obama administration--said of Barajas' experience trying to enter the United States.
McCutcheon explained that non-immigrant visa applicants are usually only afforded a few minutes to present their papers--and their cases--at an officer's window.
Some consular officers, she said, "are making decisions willy-nilly based on notions they brought with them from home."
"Younger people looking to make a career in the foreign service are much more attuned to what's going to please the consular chief."
"Mostly entry-level foreign service officers work at consular visa windows," McCutcheon continued. "Younger people looking to make a career in the foreign service are much more attuned to what's going to please the consular chief, or which way the political winds are currently blowing in Washington."
"In order to move their own careers forward," she added, "there might be some who, either subconsciously or due to their preconceived notions," engage in discriminatory behavior.
McCutcheon saw it herself while serving as an officer at the U.S. Embassy in Astana, Kazakhstan during the Obama and Trump administrations. In August 2017 she filed a dissent cable decrying what she alleged was a "lack of understanding of LGBTQI issues" among in-country U.S. consular officials after two well-qualified transgender visa applicants were denied visas.
One of these was a young woman named Sultana Kali who, after being expelled from her school in 2015 due to her gender identity, was set to attend Lane Community College in Eugene, Oregon. Of the 15 Kazakh applicants accepted into Lane since 2010, only Kali--who appeared in the U.S. Embassy's 2016 Human Rights Day video--was denied a visa. "This fact," McCutcheon wrote in her dissent, "raises the question" of whether consular officers are "expressing latent transphobia."
Speaking now, McCutcheon dispenses with diplomatic delicacy: Kali "was denied simply because she was trans," she said.
Discriminatory denials happened even during the Obama administration. Central American trans rights activists Mixair Nolasco, Stacy Vasquez Velasquez, and Ambar Alvarado Alfaro were invited to attend the 2015 Organization of American States General Assembly in Washington, D.C. Despite having all their documentation in order, the women were denied visas.
So, has the Biden administration lived up to its lofty pro-trans rhetoric when it comes to transgender people outside the United States--especially from the Global South--trying to enter the country?
For trans people without permission to enter the U.S., the answer largely remains no. Undocumented asylum-seeking trans immigrants still report physical, psychological, and sexual abuse while in U.S. immigration lockups.
But for others, especially those with the means and privilege to travel abroad, there have been noticeable improvements. When asked if things have changed for the better internally at the State Department, McCutcheon--who retired in 2019--replied affirmatively.
"There are now more trans foreign service officers. Still less than 10, but an order-of-magnitude improvement."
For one thing, "there are now more trans foreign service officers," she said. "Still less than 10, but an order-of-magnitude improvement."
McCutcheon relates that Kali gave up on trying to come to the U.S. and is now living in Europe.
"I don't know if she'll ever want to visit the United States after her experience," she added.
Barajas would like to return to the U.S. to finish what she was unable to start.
"We are all together in the same world" she said. "We are all only human and we all deserve to have the same opportunities in life."
"I still want to go to Pride in San Francisco. I want to work with Latino LGBT and trans activists there," she added. "Many Latino trans people live in the U.S. I want to show them my life, to give them an example of what they can do in their lives if they want it. I want my wings back."
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