Islamic Charities—Guantanamo Bay Detainees

For four years, Adel Hassan Hamad has been detained at Guantanamo Bay, “based in part on allegations that he worked for two charity groups in Afghanistan that the US military says support terrorism.”^[1] Neither of the charities, however, appear on the State Department’s list of designated terrorist organizations.^[2] The most recent public list of designated foreign terrorist organizations [hereinafter FTOs] was promulgated on October 11, 2005.^[3]

Another individual at Guantanamo, “whose name does not appear in the record,” is being held in part “because he worked for the International Islamic Relief Organization,” which has branches in the Philippines and Indonesia and is accused by the US Treasury Department as being linked to terrorism.^[4] The IIRO, however, often participates in a UN council on economic and social issues, and it, too, is not on the FTO list.^[5] Scores of detainees, in fact, are linked to “legally recognized Muslim charities that are considered mainstream in the Middle East, are not on the State Department’s terrorist list, and employ relief workers around the globe.”^[6]

While the Department of Defense says that the publicly available information on the individuals—which is available on the DOD’s website—contains only unclassified information, and therefore may not include more serious evidence, it is troubling that the DOD “is citing mere association with these organizations … as reasons for detaining people.”^[7] As we showed the other day, in a federal criminal trial, mere association with a guilty person does not connote guilt, and in fact, such evidence should not even be introduced against a defendant.

We have discussed a number of problems with Guantanamo, the primary problem being the fact that a large number of the detainees are unable to be released, even though there are no charges pending against them, and none are likely to be brought. Last week it was reported that “six men suspected of plotting to attack the US embassy” in Sarajevo, and who were brought to Guantanamo, are still at the base, “even though the original allegations about the embassy attack have been discredited and dropped.”^[8] In 2004, Bosnian prosecutors formally exonerated the men, and the Bosnian prime minister asked the Bush administration to release them, “calling the case a miscarriage of justice.”^[9] While the men apparently went from Algeria to Bosnia during the 1992-1995 Bosnian war to fight, they became humanitarian aid workers after the war.^[10] Senior Bosnian officials have said that they have been told by US diplomats that the men will never be allowed to return to Bosnia, where they have dual citizenship, and Algeria has so far balked at the United States requests to take the prisoners back “on the condition that they be confined or kept under surveillance there.”^[11]

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[1] Farah Stockman, At Guantanamo, Accusations Over Ties to Charities, Boston Globe (via International Herald Tribune), Aug. 31, 2006.
[2] Id.
[3] See Office of Counterterrorism, Fact Sheet: Foreign Terrorist Organizations, Dept. of State, Oct. 11, 2005, last visited Aug. 31, 2006.
[4] Stockman, supra note 1.
[5] Id.
[6] Id.
[7] Id.
[8] Craig Whitlock, At Guantanamo, Caught in a Legal Trap Washington Post, Aug. 21, 2006.
[9] Id.
[10] Id.
[11] Id.