Victim of American terrorism Binyam Mohamed arrives in UK

BBC, Feb 233, 2009

Binyam Mohamed: His full statement

Mr Mohamed claims confessions were obtained using torture

A British resident who said he was tortured while being detained at Guantanamo Bay for more than four years has issued a statement on the eve of his return to the UK.

Ethiopian-born Binyam Mohamed, 30, says his experience was worse than his “darkest nightmares”.

Here is his statement in full:

I hope you will understand that after everything I have been through I am neither physically nor mentally capable of facing the media on the moment of my arrival back to Britain.

It is still difficult for me to believe that I was abducted, hauled from one country to the next, and tortured in medieval ways - all orchestrated by the United States government Binyam Mohamed

Please forgive me if I make a simple statement through my lawyer. I hope to be able to do better in days to come, when I am on the road to recovery.

I have been through an experience that I never thought to encounter in my darkest nightmares. Before this ordeal, “torture” was an abstract word to me. I could never have imagined that I would be its victim.

It is still difficult for me to believe that I was abducted, hauled from one country to the next, and tortured in medieval ways - all orchestrated by the United States government.

‘I have a duty’

While I want to recover, and put it all as far in my past as I can, I also know I have an obligation to the people who still remain in those torture chambers.

My own despair was greatest when I thought that everyone had abandoned me. I have a duty to make sure that nobody else is forgotten.

I am grateful that in the end I was not simply left to my fate. I am grateful to my lawyers and other staff at Reprieve, and to Lt Col Yvonne Bradley, who fought for my freedom.

Lawyer Clive Stafford-Smith reads a statement on Binyam Mohamed’s behalf

I am grateful to the members of the British Foreign Office who worked for my release. And I want to thank people around Britain who wrote to me in Guantanamo Bay to keep my spirits up, as well as to the members of the media who tried to make sure that the world knew what was going on.

I know I would not be home in Britain today if it were not for everyone’s support. Indeed, I might not be alive at all.

I wish I could say that it is all over, but it is not. There are still 241 Muslim prisoners in Guantanamo.

Many have long since been cleared even by the US military, yet cannot go anywhere as they face persecution. For example, Ahmed bel Bacha lived here in Britain, and desperately needs a home.

‘Horrors’

Then there are thousands of other prisoners held by the US elsewhere around the world, with no charges, and without access to their families.

And I have to say, more in sadness than in anger, that many have been complicit in my own horrors over the past seven years.

For myself, the very worst moment came when I realised in Morocco that the people who were torturing me were receiving questions and materials from British intelligence.

I had met with British intelligence in Pakistan. I had been open with them. Yet the very people who I had hoped would come to my rescue, I later realised, had allied themselves with my abusers.

I am not asking for vengeance; only that the truth should be made known, so that nobody in the future should have to endure what I have endured.

Tags: torture, Guantanamo Bay, Binyam Mohamed, British Foreign Office, release, US prisoners