How The United States Kidnapped, Imprisoned And Tortured Murat Kurnaz
Murat Kurnaz is an innocent man, with no links to terrorists. The United States apparently paid a Pakistani cop who kidnapped him from a bus. For five years, we imprisoned and tortured him. Here is a brief introduction to his story on 60 Minutes.
My country has become less and less recognizable to me over the past seven years. It has always struck me as significant that the very people who frantically wave the flag at every opportunity, reflexively proclaim this to be the greatest country in the universe and so forth are also the ones who are most willing to defend actions of this kind--that is, of the most unAmerican type.
I'll tell you, I thought I was going to burst into tears while I was watching this 60 Minutes segment. Not even for Kurnaz, as compelling as his story is. But, rather, for my country. Those of you who think that God is just may want to do likewise.
(It didn't help that the segment after this one was about Al Gore, thus highlighting what might have been for this country...)
Murat Kurnaz is an innocent man, with no links to terrorists. The United States apparently paid a Pakistani cop who kidnapped him from a bus. For five years, we imprisoned and tortured him. Here is a brief introduction to his story on 60 Minutes.
My country has become less and less recognizable to me over the past seven years. It has always struck me as significant that the very people who frantically wave the flag at every opportunity, reflexively proclaim this to be the greatest country in the universe and so forth are also the ones who are most willing to defend actions of this kind--that is, of the most unAmerican type.
I'll tell you, I thought I was going to burst into tears while I was watching this 60 Minutes segment. Not even for Kurnaz, as compelling as his story is. But, rather, for my country. Those of you who think that God is just may want to do likewise.
(It didn't help that the segment after this one was about Al Gore, thus highlighting what might have been for this country...)
posted by Winston Smith at
7:39 PM
24 Comments:
In an interview on German TV last year, Murat Kurnaz apparently said
"Almost every time that someone had to go to the medical center and was away for a few days, he usually came back with a body part missing. I saw this with my own eyes: that one or another of my neighbors was taken to the medical center and then came back and something had been amputated. Even though he had not been sick and it wasn't necessary. For instance, fingers that were perfectly healthy."
Now, some people find this sort of thing easy to believe, I'm sure. Me, it makes me think Murat Kurnaz is not the type of fellow who always tells the truth.
Lesley Stahl's nodding, fawning interview with Al Gore was excellent. And flipping over to NBC, there was "journalist" Keith Olbermann fulminating over Bush with NBC "news analyst" Rachel Maedow of Air America. In prime time, on NBC, not MSNBC.
The mainstream media, fair and balanced, as always.
Hey, over there, an adverb, 'apparently'. Well-dosed with disbelief but no evidence against WS's statement.
I once had this same disbelief that my government would practice tortures that it had condemned consistently through all the ugliness of the 20th century, but not more. Even this one particular case doesn't matter. The Bush regime has admitted publicly to enough torture that we know the core allegations could well be true, are even likely to be true.
Welcome, Tom, come to defend the indefensible for the morally bankrupt party of torture and of Kafkaesque imprisonment. You're the right man for opposing all that America has stood for and embracing all that we have stood against, all in the name of stupid and counterproductive policies that haven't made us safer, only more fearful and subject to further usurpations of Tories.
You're getting on your high horse against someone who is not me.
I don't believe the amputations bit, and that makes me doubt a lot of his other charges.
You accept them without question? What can I say. Surely nothing that would make a difference.
"Me, it makes me think Murat Kurnaz is not the type of fellow who always tells the truth."
Please elaborate...
As for me, I'm on LL's side. I think that, in the wake of what the United States government has actually admitted to, we have ample reason to believe a testimony such as Kurnaz's.
-Baggins
As long as it's only the contrary allegations you're interested in, there's nothing you can say. If you became interested in the Bushist regime's false imprisonment (here, the least possible crime), torture (yet to be proven but credible), and amputation (hard to believe in Gitmo but not so hard to believe, at least as an exaggeration of facts, in Kandahar - so did this allegation come from a real source?), if you become interested in redressing any of this, let me know, as that might be worth listening to.
Well, I'll try, although I think being ready to believe the amputations bit more than that this fellow would lie indicates you might not be genuinely interested, and nothing I say will make you even question your convictions.
From what I gather, just 3 weeks after 9-11, Kurnaz, a German citizen with Turkish passport, went to Pakistan of all places to "study Islam."
Now that may be true, or he went there to hook up with jihad.
Regardless, his situation was unusual enough---even for Pakistan---for somebody to finger him as a terrorist suspect, and he got scooped up in the net.
It became clear after while that although he had Islamist sympathies, he probably wasn't a terrorist. But for their own reasons---likely their complicity in helping the Americans with the "net," the Germans didn't want him back. He'd be a headache in the anti-American German media. So they let the Americans keep him, and indeed hoped some evidence he actually was a terrorist would turn up.
But it didn't. Meanwhile, Kurnaz was a difficult prisoner, so he probably was not treated gently at Gitmo.
Come 2006, finding no definitive evidence, the Americans finally let him go. Kurnaz goes back to Germany, tells a lot of lies like the amputations bit, gets a book deal, and hits the media circuit, which eats it all up. 60 Minutes, with no juicy anti-administration stories in the works, fire up this one, which was "news" a year or two ago, although not now.
Now you can believe this guy with Islamist sympathies is mostly lying to make the US look bad, or you can believe that your country does amputations on helpless prisoners out of some general commitment to sadism.
Now, this is my source [although I used several left-wing ones trumpeting the German government's embarrassment over the whole affair]:
http://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/blog/blog.aspx?id=869
which doesn't look definitive to me either, although the meat of it is a translation from a German parliament member's German-language website. [Why a minor German official? Because Kurnaz is radioactive to the German government. The less said the better.]
However, the key here is Kurnaz' Islamic sympathies. The Western media has been playing him as some hapless innocent randomly plucked off the streets and tortured just for the hell of it by the evil Bush-Cheney machine. [And in the German media, with the help of German government.]
I find this unlikely. What is more reasonable to me was he was a wannabe jihadist in the wrong place at a very bad time, mouthed off a lot to the Germans and the Americans, and was given harsh interrogation treatment because he seemed like a genuine jihadist at the time. According to the German parliament member, there was good reason to suspect he was, as he had palpable links to some bad guys.
Purportedly from Kurnaz' security file:
The classification of Murat Kurnaz as a security risk was based on the following findings, among others:
1. On October 3, 2001 - three weeks after the September 11 terrorist attacks - Kurnaz set off to Pakistan with his friend Selcuk Bilgin, without saying goodbye to his family or informing his school. He broke off his course of studies in midstream. According to his mother, he purchased heavy boots and two pairs of binoculars immediately prior to his departure.
2. Kurnaz's and Bilgin's airplane tickets were paid for by Sofyen Ben Amor. In a telephone conversation with the Bremen-based preacher of hate Ali Miri that was wiretapped by the police, Ben Amor described himself as a "Taliban."
3. According to his mother, in the weeks prior to his departure, Kurnaz "was brainwashed" by Ali Miri at the Abu-Bakr Mosque in Bremen. The Bremen police continue to assume still today that Kurnaz was radicalized by Ali Miri. Also according to the assessment of both [the German foreign intelligence service] the BND and [the German domestic intelligence service] the BfV, Kurnaz's biography follows a typical path of radicalization and "awakening."
4. Independently of one another, two direct witnesses have declared to the Bremen police that Kurnaz approved of the September 11 terrorist attacks, describing them as "God's will."
5. On October 3, 2001, the brother of Selcuk Bilgin notified the Federal Police [which is responsible for border security in Germany] that Selcuk "is following a friend to Afghanistan, in order to fight." His later attempts to relativize this declaration have been dismissed as not credible by the police. The wife of Bilgin, moreover, has confirmed to Kurnaz's mother that Bilgin and Kurnaz wanted to go to Afghanistan.
6. Bilgin was arrested at the airport and thus prevented from embarking on his voyage with Kurnaz. Later, in 2003, the police determined that he was continuing to try to recruit young, inexperienced Muslims for Jihad at the Abu-Bakr Mosque. Thus Ali T., who on April 25, 2003 hijacked a bus in Bremen, stated to the police that Bilgin had awakened in him the desire to become a Mujahideen through conversations and prayers and by showing him propaganda videos. According to Ali T., Bilgin promised that he would have him trained as a fighter in Pakistan or Afghanistan, just as he had done in the past with Murat Kurnaz. The training, Bilgin is reported to have said, would be financed by Al Qaida. The Bremen police thus assumed that after his failed attempt to travel with Kurnaz, Bilgin had been promoted from a prospective fighter to a "Recruiter/Logistics Specialist."
7. According to police investigations, there are numerous links between the Taliban Sofyen Ben Amor, who purchased Kurnaz's plane tickets, and the "Hamburg Cell" [which planned the 9/11 attacks]. Thus, for example, Ben Amor's telephone number was found in an address book that was seized during a Hamburg raid carried out as part of the Federal District Attorney's investigation against, among others, Ramzi Bin Al-Shibh in connection with the attacks of September 11, 2001.
The police have determined, moreover, that up until September 11, 2001, Sofyen Ben Amor frequently withdrew money in the vicinity of the Al-Quds Mosque in Hamburg. It was at this mosque that the "Hamburg Cell" formed around Mohammad Atta.
Finally, there are also numerous pieces of evidence in the file that indicate that Ben Amor, Bilgin, and Kurnaz have links to Mohammad Haydar Zammar, one of the most important recruiters of the "Hamburg Cell."
Is any of the above fact? I have no way of knowing, but it seems more plausible to me. But now that I've been the first one [again] to commit to an inquiry, you're now free to sit back and try to pick holes in it. At the end, I'm unreasonable and a blind Bush defender. Lather, rinse, repeat.
But before you do all that, I'd rather you consider just joining WS in freezing me out. Or didn't you get the memo?
More excuses.
Again, no grappling with the general willingness, even eagerness, of America's Bushist government - and a substantial part of the Chicken Little Republican base - to torture. None. Just allegations about why this guy might be a slightly bad guy.
As for your jest that I can't question my own beliefs, well, I already made clear (to those who actually read) that I question the amputation story in its full glory: "amputation (hard to believe in Gitmo but not so hard to believe, at least as an exaggeration of facts, in Kandahar...)". It's easy to believe that Kurnaz saw evidence of one amputation, maybe even medically necessary, and pumped it up for some of the reasons you suggest. It's also possible that his ordeal made it hard to distinguish and remember reality.
With your endpoints identified, as mathematicians say, it's no wonder you can't see that you're blaming the messenger for ugly reality.
Since I don't read Tom's comments anymore, somebody let me know if there's anything important in there.
Again, no grappling with the general willingness, even eagerness, of America's Bushist government - and a substantial part of the Chicken Little Republican base - to torture. None. Just allegations about why this guy might be a slightly bad guy.
Yup. The rest is an old discussion, and you always win. You and yours are a paragon of virtue; your opponents are morally heinous.
But I tried, silly me. Never one to step away from a sincere challenge. Hi, WS.
Note to WS: Nope, nothing important going on in here, just the usual fakery and bullshit from our interblatherer, TVD.
Just checking.
Oh, my. It's one thing to stick your fingers in your ears and go la-la-la, another to yell it so loudly.
Ignore away. Freeze me out. But to make such a show of it? Choking smoker, don't you think the joker laughs at you?
Koo, koo, kachoo.
As to the topic, the relevance is from your opening sentence,
Murat Kurnaz is an innocent man, with no links to terrorists.
No. See above.
You apparently believed without question the television show 60 Minutes, although I don't blame you for that. If it's on 60 Minutes, most of us believe it's true.
But the guy's unquestionably a liar.
Koo, koo, kachoo.
Now, ignore me or engage me, but since I sign my real name around here and have done so for years, and so I won't permit you to down me or attempt to embarrass me, WS.
Truce? Constructive engagement? Fine. You're one of the smartest people from your side of the aisle I've ever come across on the internet. I've always considered it an honor to be in your company.
I sign my real name around here and have done so for years
Why do think that entitles you to any kind of extra consideration?
A truth or opinion has a validity independent of who it comes from, named or otherwise.
I won't permit you to down me or attempt to embarrass me, WS.
You do that on your own TVD, and as we say here in the Central Valley of California, if you don't like the stink, don't stir up the s***.
Truce? Constructive engagement? Fine.
Why am I reminded of the Black Knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail?
Oh, I think I effectively impeached Kurnaz' credibility. To take the 60 Minutes report at face value is foolish.
The rest of the back-and-forth with my fans is just the usual nonsense.
I'm so proud of you, WS.
I finally took your crackpot Buddhist advice...and I'm much happier for it.
I don't know why everybody says you people are so crazy...
It's not me that makes you unhappy. It's your leftism that makes you unhappy.
You were unhappy well before I ever arrived on the scene. Poke through your archives.
"Delusions are states of mind which, when they arise within our mental continuum, leave us disturbed, confused and unhappy.
Therefore, those states of mind which delude or afflict us
are called 'delusions' or 'afflictive emotions'."
---His Holiness the Dalai Lama
BDS kills.
Well that clears things up. I had thought it was BS that killed.
Happy to straighten you out, LL. It's your delusions. And your anger, of course, which is the only reason you're still here.
[I've seen your blog, man.]
I'm deluded? Yah, that's from a guy who couldn't find his ass with both hands while sitting on his own face.
I've seen your blog, too. Too boring and virulently wrong-headed to bother stopping in again.
The subject was anger and unhappiness, which once again you display in spades.
Tom, I see where your coming from, and I agree that if such testimony actually exist they would tend to impeach Kurnaz.
But you can't cite unsourced articles that purportedly excerpt his intel files without reliable sources to back them up. I'm not trying to imply that you are lying; I'm suggesting that some people lie to make political points. "Obama is a secret Muslim" comes to mind. Such things can be carefully written both to match a few well known points and to sound authoritative.
I'm suspicious of your cite because the CBS article has the following statements on the record, from the guy's laywer and the german government.
"But far worse than the false charges was the secret government file that Azmy uncovered.
Six months after Kurnaz reached Guantanamo, U.S. military intelligence had written, "criminal investigation task force has no definite link [or] evidence of detainee having an association with al Qaeda or making any specific threat toward the U.S."
At the same time, German intelligence agents wrote their government, saying, "USA considers Murat Kurnaz’s innocence to be proven. He is to be released in approximately six to eight weeks."
These are fairly definitive statements that can easily be verified (or not). As long as they still stand, "purported" or "apparent" arguments won't hold up without hard evidence. (Like a direct cite to the amputation interview, in the original.)
- mac
Oh, TVD, thank you so much for your concern! Everyone needs a hand now and then, even me. Your sincerity and fellow feeling are so clear as to be unmistakable. Hold on - I'm about to weep tears of joy - give me a minute to compose myself...
Is that the topic, oh Tom, or have I strayed once again from the official Tom-approved discourse?
Should I leave some smilies? Nah. Not necessary for the rest of the Philo-denizens.
(Thanks, by the way, to mac, too, for bringing up a totally new and engaging topic.)
Mac, there were some things I found on lefty websites that said the German gov't didn't want Kurnaz back because he was an embarrassment to them, so he just sat there in Gitmo.
Still, it appears his charges of mistreatment are all suspect, since he went over the top with the aputation stuff.
I'd have backed up what I wrote even more thoroughly, but it became obvious that
"lovable liberal" wanted a fight, not an examination of the facts.
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