A US military investigation into three apparent suicides last month at the Guantanamo Bay prison has found that other detainees may have helped the men hang themselves or were also planning to try to kill themselves at some point.
After searching the cells of detainees other than those found hanged to death before dawn on June 10, authorities found instructions on tying knots along with several notes in Arabic that were "relevant" to an investigation into a possible broader plot, a US official said in court papers filed late on Friday in Washington.
Authorities confiscated personal papers from nearly all 450 prisoners at Guantanamo Bay to pursue "all logical leads" in the investigation and to "determine whether other suicides were planned or likely to be planned," said Carol Kisthardt of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service in an affidavit.
In a separate affidavit, the detention center's commander, Navy Rear Admiral Harry Harris, said investigators believe "the suicides may have been part of a larger plan or pact for more suicides that day or in the immediate future."
Both affidavits were filed in support of a US government request for a judge to appoint a special review panel to review all the documents seized from Guantanamo detainees.
The panel should include lawyers, law enforcement and intelligence personnel and translators who have not taken part in any legal proceedings against detainees to ensure their independence and protect the legal rights of detainees, the government said.
Investigators said they confiscated about 500kg of personal documents, including letters from attorneys, after three detainees were found hanging from their steel mesh cells -- the first reported deaths of prisoners at the prison.
Lawyers for Guantanamo detainees have condemned the confiscation of the legal papers as a violation of attorney-client privilege and have asked a judge to order their immediate return.
Bill Goodman, legal director at the Center for Constitutional Rights based in New York, which represents about 200 detainees at the facility, said the government's request for a special review panel would undermine trust between prisoners and their lawyers and delay the legal process.
"It's another road block," Goodman said.
Authorities took the papers after finding a note in Arabic related to the suicides in the mesh wall of one of the prisoners found hanged to death, Kisthardt said.
The note did not appear to be written by one of the detainees who committed suicide and it was written on paper provided by lawyers stamped with the words "Attorney Client Privilege."
Among the papers, investigators also found an e-mail from someone on the base that reputedly contained sensitive information about the location of cells and operations at the camp, where the US holds men suspected of links to the Taliban or al-Qaeda.
Investigators also confiscated envelopes from detainees marked "Attorney-Client Privilege" but did not review the contents to see if they had any relevant information, Kisthardt said.
The government, in its request to the judge, said the special panel, or so-called "Filter Team," would review all the material and report any information that threatens national security or involves "imminent violence" but would not divulge anything that would violate attorney-client privilege.
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
‘BODIES EVERYWHERE’: The incident occurred at a Filipino festival celebrating an anti-colonial leader, with the driver described as a ‘lone suspect’ known to police Canadian police arrested a man on Saturday after a car plowed into a street party in the western Canadian city of Vancouver, killing a number of people. Authorities said the incident happened shortly after 8pm in Vancouver’s Sunset on Fraser neighborhood as members of the Filipino community gathered to celebrate Lapu Lapu Day. The festival, which commemorates a Filipino anti-colonial leader from the 16th century, falls this year on the weekend before Canada’s election. A 30-year-old local man was arrested at the scene, Vancouver police wrote on X. The driver was a “lone suspect” known to police, a police spokesperson told journalists at the
RSS