Background Briefing

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II. Transfer to Guantanamo

Former detainees describe their transfer to Guantanamo as taking place in conditions of significant physical discomfort and sensory deprivation through the use of painted-out goggles and earmuffs.  Some also report that the transfer process involved being subjected to physical procedures that—however reasonable from a security perspective—were nonetheless humiliating for them, such as strip and cavity searches; shaving of head, facial and body hair; and being photographed naked.

Several former prisoners have described being stripped and searched prior to and immediately after transfer to Guantanamo.  Tarek Dergoul from the UK alleges that he was photographed naked in the detention facility at Kandahar airport immediately prior to being put on a plane taking him on the first leg of his journey to Guantanamo.1  An Afghan former detainee told Human Rights Watch:

Before we were taken to Guantanamo, they took samples of our beard hair and measured our height and recorded our voice.  Then they made us change our clothes and made us put on red clothes.  They shaved my head and beard and moustache.2 

Briton Shafiq Rasul described having his hair and beard shaved off, his clothes cut off, being covered in delousing powder, and having a full body (including cavity) search before being given the orange overalls to wear and being cuffed and chained for the flight to Guantanamo.3  Tarek Dergoul was transferred to Guantanamo on 1 May 2002, describing the flight itself, he stated:

I was given an orange jumpsuit to wear and I was tied by my arm4 with a rope in a line of other detainees.  I was also chained with the three-piece suit [a belt with hand shackles attached to it and with a metal bar leading down to leg-irons] around my arms, legs and waist.  I had goggles on my eyes and earmuffs but no gloves or hood.  I couldn’t see or hear anything.  The elastic on the goggles and the earmuffs was cutting into my ears and eyes.  On the plane we were sat on the floor and couldn’t talk.  The air was blowing on my head and my head was aching.5

Pakistani former detainee Abdul Razak was transferred to Guantanamo in June 2002.  He told Human Rights Watch: “There were rumors we were being taken to Cuba but the Americans never said anything.  Once 25-30 of us were on the plane, our hands and feet were tied.  They told us to shut up and be silent.  It seemed we were on the plane for 18 hours.”6  Sayed Abbasin, from Afghanistan, told a BBC interviewer that he was also not told why he was being transferred, or where he was being taken.  He said: “I arrived tied and gagged; it was the act of an animal to treat a human being like that. It was the worst day of my life.”7 

Britons Shafiq Rasul and Asif Iqbal, who were in the second batch of prisoners transferred to Guantanamo, on January 13, 2002, also described being dressed in earmuffs, painted-out goggles and surgical masks before being placed on the plane.  They were chained to the floor for the duration of the 22-hour flight, with no access to a toilet.8 According to Shafiq Rasul, “during the plane journey the shackles had been on so tight that they really cut into me.  I still have scarring on my left arm from them and I lost the feeling in my right hand for a long time because they were on so tight.”9Afghan former detainee Muhammad Naim Farooq, interviewed by Amnesty International, described how the tightness of his handcuffs during the transfer injured his wrists, and he said that many of his fellow detainees were crying “because of pain” or because they were “getting mad”.10

Tarek Dergoul also describes rough handling by guards during the transfer: 

No one told us what was happening . . . At some stage we changed planes, I don’t know where.  When this happened we were dragged to the airplane one by one by our cuffs.  I could not walk due to the frostbite in my feet.  I tried to complain but they just dragged me even harder.  They were pulling me by my hand so the handcuffs cut into my hand.  When I was not walking fast enough they were just dragging me.11

The flights to Guantanamo included a stopover during which the detainees changed planes; many of the detainees did not know where the stopover took place. Ruhal Ahmed, a British detainee who was on the fifth flight to Guantanamo on 10 February 2002, described his experience during the stopover:

On the way to the other plane we were moved, bent double quite quickly.  A soldier at some point, stamped on the chain between my ankles which brought the cuffs around my ankles down very hard. It was extremely painful.  I was not offered the opportunity to use the toilet at any stage.12

Describing what happened after the plane landed at Guantanamo, Mohammed Sangir from Pakistan recounted: “While we still had our hands tied behind our backs and our eyes blindfolded, I was thrown outside and beaten by some soldiers.”13 Shah Mohammed Alikhil, another Pakistani, told Human Rights Watch:

Some soldiers came and took us from the flight: they held me on both sides in such a way that both my feet were up and they were dragging me forward.  [Afterwards] I was put inside the cell with iron bars, which was as big as two beds put next to each other…. There, my eyes were opened [uncovered] and my clothes were changed and my beard and hair were shaved.14 

Tarek Dergoul also reported being stripped again, after arrival at Guantanamo, and undergoing a full body (including cavity) search.  Afghan former detainee N.H. told Human Rights Watch that he was stripped naked at the Guantanamo hospital on arrival.15 Abdul Razak, on the other hand, told Human Rights Watch that his initial medical check on arrival at Guantanamo consisted only of a blood test and weight check and that he was photographed fully clothed.16

Briton Asif Iqbal described how after the detainees were taken off the plane, they were then put in a bus, driven a while in the bus, and then the bus was put on a ferry, which took the detainees across the bay from the landing strip to the detention facility. “On the bus we sat cross legged on the floor (the seats had been removed) and were thrown about because of the movement of the bus, but soldiers would still punch or kick us if we moved.”17 The final stage of the transfer was made inside a school bus on board a ferry across the bay from the landing strip to the detention facility. Ruhal Ahmed alleges he was repeatedly kicked in the leg by a guard during the ferry crossing, and he believes this was because he had earlier revealed that he spoke English. “I had a large bruise on my leg and couldn’t walk for nearly one month.  There was never anyone to complain to about these sorts of attacks and I think they are still going on.”18

For many, the trip to Guantanamo followed weeks of brutalizing treatment in detention in Afghanistan, including at US-run facilities at Bagram and Kandahar.  All of the former Guantanamo detainees who gave statements directly to Human Rights Watch, and many of the others whose accounts are cited in this briefing, have also described having been held, prior to their transfer to Guantanamo, either at the Bagram Airbase or at the now-closed facility at Kandahar airport, or at both.  Some of their experiences there have been described already by Human Rights Watch in its March 2004 report “Enduring Freedom: Abuses by U.S. Forces in Afghanistan.”19



[1] Statement by Tarek Dergoul made available to Human Rights Watch, May 24, 2004.

[2] Human Rights Watch interview with A. (name withheld), February 6, 2004.

[3] Statement of Shafiq Rasul, Asif Iqbal and Rhuhel Ahmed, “Detention in Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay,” released publicly on August 4, 2004, para. 46-52, available online at: http://www.ccr-ny.org/v2/reports/docs/Gitmo-compositestatementFINAL23july04.pdf, accessed on August 19, 2004;  David Rose, “How we survived jail hell,” The Observer, London, March 14, 2004, available online at: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,6903,1168937,00.html, accessed on May 18, 2004. 

[4] Tarek Dergoul has only one arm.  The other arm (his left) was amputated above the elbow after he sustained shrapnel wounds in an air-raid on the house in which he had been staying in Jalalabad, Afghanistan. One of his big toes was also amputated because of an infection following frostbite.

[5] Statement by Tarek Dergoul made available to Human Rights Watch, May 24, 2004.

[6] Human Rights Watch interview with Abdul Razak, June 4, 2004.

[7] BBC TV, Newsnight, June 5, 2003 (translation), quoted in Amnesty International, “United States of America: The threat of a bad example,” AI Index: AMR 51/114/2003, August 19, 2003. 

[8] Shafiq Rasul and Asif Iqbal, Open Letter to the U.S.Senate Armed Services Committee, 13 May 2004; on file at Human Rights Watch.  See also, Statement of Shafiq Rasul, Asif Iqbal and Rhuhel Ahmed, “Detention in Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay,” released publicly on August 4, 2004, para. 46-52, available online at: http://www.ccr-ny.org/v2/reports/docs/Gitmo-compositestatementFINAL23july04.pdf, accessed on August 19, 2004.

[9] Ibid., para. 51.

[10] Quoted in Amnesty International, “United States of America: The threat of a bad example,” AI Index: AMR 51/114/2003, August 19, 2003.

[11] Statement by Tarek Dergoul made available to Human Rights Watch, May 24, 2004.

[12] Statement of Shafiq Rasul, Asif Iqbal and Rhuhel Ahmed, “Detention in Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay,” released publicly on August 4, 2004, para. 50, available online at: http://www.ccr-ny.org/v2/reports/docs/Gitmo-compositestatementFINAL23july04.pdf, accessed on August 19, 2004.  See also David Rose, “How we survived jail hell,” The Observer, London, March 14, 2004, available online at: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,6903,1168937,00.html, accessed on May 18, 2004.

[13] Françoise Chipaux, “The Guantánamo Archipelago – Escape from Camp Delta,” Le Monde, March 11, 2004, available online (in translation) at: http://www.cageprisoners.com/articles.php?aid=1242, accessed on July 1, 2004.

[14] Human Rights Watch interview with Shah Mohammed Alikhil, January 3, 2004.

[15] Human Rights Watch interview with N.H (name withheld), June 2, 2004.

[16] Human Rights Watch interview with Abdul Razak, June 4, 2004.

[17] Statement of Shafiq Rasul, Asif Iqbal and Rhuhel Ahmed, “Detention in Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay,” released publicly on August 4, 2004, para. 56, available online at: http://www.ccr-ny.org/v2/reports/docs/Gitmo-compositestatementFINAL23july04.pdf, accessed on August 19, 2004.

[18] Statement of Shafiq Rasul, Asif Iqbal and Rhuhel Ahmed, “Detention in Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay,” released publicly on August 4, 2004, para. 57, available online at: http://www.ccr-ny.org/v2/reports/docs/Gitmo-compositestatementFINAL23july04.pdf, accessed on August 19, 2004; David Rose, “How we survived jail hell,” The Observer, London, March 14, 2004, available online at: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,6903,1168937,00.html, accessed on May 18, 2004.

[19] Human Rights Watch, “Enduring Freedom: Abuses by U.S. Forces in Afghanistan,” March 8, 2004, available online at http://hrw.org/reports/2004/afghanistan0304/.  See also the description of treatment by U.S. personnel prior to in Statement of Shafiq Rasul, Asif Iqbal and Rhuhel Ahmed, “Detention in Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay,” released publicly on August 4, 2004, available online at: http://www.ccr-ny.org/v2/reports/docs/Gitmo-compositestatementFINAL23july04.pdf, accessed on August 19, 2004. 


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