Bisher al-Rawi

Bisher al-Rawi is a British resident whose family fled Iraq and came to England in 1984, after his father was imprisoned and tortured by Saddam Hussein’s regime. He was released from Guantánamo Bay in March 2007.

His entire family are British citizens; it was decided that, as the youngest member of the family, Bisher should retain his Iraqi citizenship in case they were ever able to make a claim in the future on their property and assets, which had been seized by the Ba'athist regime.

In 2002, Bisher’s brother Wahab developed a business plan to take advantage of the peanuts that grew plentifully in Gambia. He sank £250,000 into a mobile peanut processing plant that could turn the crop into oil. Bisher and his best friend Jamil el Banna, a refugee from Jordan, joined the effort.

On the way to Gambia, the police detained Bisher and Jamil at Gatwick aiport under teh Terrorism Act 2000, and alleged that they were carrying a dangerous weapon. Their lawyer, Gareth Peirce, went to the Argos catalogue store and bought an identical ‘weapon’ – proving that it was a battery charger. During this time, both men’s families were put through harassment and searches before it was clear there was nothing to be found. Two MI5 agents then reassured Bisher and Jamil that they had nothing to worry about travelling to Gambia.

It is clear that British officials encouraged both men to travel on this wholly innocent business trip to Gambia, and then actively worked with the US to effect his detention and rendition to Afghanistan and Guantanamo.

The moment Bisher and his business partners touched down in Gambia on November 8th, 2002 they were all arrested. Far from being “on the battlefield,” they were further from Kabul than London is. The day after Eid 2002 they were driven to an airport, where ten people dressed in black put Bisher and Jamil in a plane to Kabul, Afghanistan.

Bisher and Jamil spent two weeks in total isolation in the “Dark Prison.” The name was apt: it was so dark the men couldn’t even see their fingers. Rats and insects ran rampant in the dank cells. The men were denied food and given only one bottle of water a day. It was winter, but the men had only a t-shirt and shorts, with no blanket.

The two were then moved to Bagram Air Force Base. At Bagram, it became clear why they had been seized. The Americans wanted them to inform on a Jordanian cleric they knew, Abu Qatada. Bisher was questioned more than 200 times about his relationship with Abu Qatada.

On February 7, 2003, Bisher and Jamil were taken to Guantánamo Bay. From March 2006 until his release a year later, Bisher was held in isolation, because he refused to speak with interrogators. Bisher reported that he spent over 100 hours with the same interrogator, answering the same questions over and over. He had nothing to hide, but the extreme repetition of the questions, combined with the apparent futility – given his seemingly endless imprisonment – in answering them, led him to refuse any further interrogations.

With neither British citizenship and with the demise of the former Iraqi regime, Bisher was left in a limbo state with no government taking responsibility for him or lobbying on his family's behalf. This is in spite of Britain being part of the interrim government in Iraq.

On 29th March 2007, British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett announced that Bisher Al Rawi would be returned to the UK shortly. He was released from Guantánamo the following day, Friday 30th March.