Mawlawi Mohammad Nabi Omari is a citizen of
Afghanistan
Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...
who was held for nearly twelve years in
extrajudicial detention
Administrative detention is arrest and detention of individuals by the state without trial. A number of jurisdictions claim that it is done for security reasons. Many countries claim to use administrative detention as a means to combat terrorism ...
in the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
Guantanamo Bay detainment camp
The Guantanamo Bay detention camp ( es, Centro de detención de la bahía de Guantánamo) is a United States military prison located within Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, also referred to as Guantánamo, GTMO, and Gitmo (), on the coast of Guant ...
s, in
Cuba
Cuba ( , ), officially the Republic of Cuba ( es, República de Cuba, links=no ), is an island country comprising the island of Cuba, as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located where the northern Caribbea ...
.
[
]
His Guantanamo
Internment Serial Number An Internment Serial Number (ISN) is an identification number assigned to captives who come under control of the United States Department of Defense (DoD) during armed conflicts.
History
On March 3, 2006, in compliance with a court order from D ...
was 832. American
intelligence analysts
Intelligence analysis is the application of individual and collective cognitive methods to weigh data and test hypotheses within a secret socio-cultural context. The descriptions are drawn from what may only be available in the form of deliberate ...
estimate that he was born in 1968, in
Khowst
Khōst ( ps, خوست) is the capital of Khost Province in Afghanistan. It is the largest city in the southeastern part of the country, and also the largest in the region of Loya Paktia. To the south and east of Khost lie Waziristan and Kurram in ...
, Afghanistan. He arrived at the
Guantanamo detention camps
The Guantanamo Bay detention camp ( es, Centro de detención de la bahía de Guantánamo) is a United States military prison located within Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, also referred to as Guantánamo, GTMO, and Gitmo (), on the coast of Guant ...
on October 28, 2002.
[
]
He was transported from Guantanamo Bay to
Qatar
Qatar (, ; ar, قطر, Qaṭar ; local vernacular pronunciation: ), officially the State of Qatar,) is a country in Western Asia. It occupies the Qatar Peninsula on the northeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula in the Middle East; it sh ...
on June 1, 2014.
[ Omari and four other men known as the ]Taliban five
The Taliban Five were five Afghan detainees at Guantanamo Bay and former high-ranking members of the Taliban government of Afghanistan who, after being held since 2002, indefinitely without charges, were exchanged in 2014 for United States Army s ...
were exchanged for captured U.S. soldier Bowe Bergdahl
Beaudry Robert "Bowe" Bergdahl (born March 28, 1986) is a United States Army soldier who was held captive from 2009 to 2014 by the Taliban-aligned Haqqani network in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Bergdahl was captured after deserting his post on Ju ...
. The men were held by the Qataris in a form of house arrest
In justice and law, house arrest (also called home confinement, home detention, or, in modern times, electronic monitoring) is a measure by which a person is confined by the authorities to their residence. Travel is usually restricted, if all ...
. The swap was brokered by the Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani
Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani ( ar, تميم بن حمد بن خليفة آل ثاني; born 3 June 1980, Doha, Qatar) is the Emir of Qatar who succeeded his father, Sheikh Hamad, after Hamad abdicated in his favour.
Tamim is the fourth son ...
Emir of Qatar
The Emir, or Amir, of the State of Qatar ( ar, أمیر دولة قطر) is the monarch and head of state of the country. He is also the commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces and guarantor of the Constitution. He holds the most powerful positio ...
. Omari and the others were required to stay in Qatar for a year as a condition of their release.
He is currently the Governor for Khost Province
Khost (Pashto/Dari: ) is one of the 34 provinces of Afghanistan, located in the southeastern part of the country. Khost consists of thirteen districts and the city of Khost serves as the capital of the province. To the east, Khost Province is bord ...
.
Official status reviews
Originally the Bush
Bush commonly refers to:
* Shrub, a small or medium woody plant
Bush, Bushes, or the bush may also refer to:
People
* Bush (surname), including any of several people with that name
**Bush family, a prominent American family that includes:
*** ...
Presidency
A presidency is an administration or the executive, the collective administrative and governmental entity that exists around an office of president of a state or nation. Although often the executive branch of government, and often personified by a ...
asserted that captives apprehended in the ''"war on terror
The war on terror, officially the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT), is an ongoing international Counterterrorism, counterterrorism military campaign initiated by the United States following the September 11 attacks. The main targets of the campa ...
"'' were not covered by the Geneva Conventions
upright=1.15, Original document in single pages, 1864
The Geneva Conventions are four treaties, and three additional protocols, that establish international legal standards for humanitarian treatment in war. The singular term ''Geneva Conven ...
, and could be held indefinitely, without charge, and without an open and transparent review of the justifications for their detention.[
]
In 2004 the United States Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
ruled, in Rasul v. Bush
''Rasul v. Bush'', 542 U.S. 466 (2004), was a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court in which the Court held that foreign nationals held in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp could petition federal courts for writs of ''habeas corpus ...
, that Guantanamo captives were entitled to being informed of the allegations justifying their detention, and were entitled to try to refute them.
Office for the Administrative Review of Detained Enemy Combatants
Following the Supreme Court's ruling the Department of Defense Department of Defence or Department of Defense may refer to:
Current departments of defence
* Department of Defence (Australia)
* Department of National Defence (Canada)
* Department of Defence (Ireland)
* Department of National Defense (Philipp ...
set up the .[
]
Scholars at the Brookings Institution
The Brookings Institution, often stylized as simply Brookings, is an American research group founded in 1916. Located on Think Tank Row in Washington, D.C., the organization conducts research and education in the social sciences, primarily in ec ...
, led by Benjamin Wittes
Benjamin Wittes (born November 5, 1969) is an American legal journalist and Senior Fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution, where he is the Research Director in Public Law, and Co-Director of the Harvard Law School–Brookings ...
, listed the captives still held in Guantanamo in December 2008, according to whether their detention was justified by certain common allegations:[
]
* Mohammad Nabi Omari was listed as one of the captives who the military alleges were members of either al Qaeda or the Taliban and associated with the other group.[
* Mohammad Nabi Omari was listed as one of the captives whose "names or aliases were found on material seized in raids on Al Qaeda safehouses and facilities."][
* Mohammad Nabi Omari was listed as one of the captives who was a member of the Taliban leadership.][
* Mohammad Nabi Omari was listed as one of "36 aptives whoopenly admit either membership or significant association with Al Qaeda, the Taliban, or some other group the government considers militarily hostile to the United States."][
* Mohammad Nabi Omari was listed as one of the captives who admitted "serving Al Qaeda or the Taliban in some non-military capacity."][
During his ]Combatant Status Review Tribunal
The Combatant Status Review Tribunals (CSRT) were a set of tribunals for confirming whether detainees held by the United States at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp had been correctly designated as "enemy combatants". The CSRTs were esta ...
Omari acknowledged he had worked for the Taliban, but claimed that was prior to 9-11.[
]
He claimed that after the US invasion he had been a loyal supporter of the Hamid Karzai
Hamid Karzai (; Pashto/ fa, حامد کرزی, , ; born 24 December 1957) is an Afghan statesman who served as the fourth president of Afghanistan from July 2002 to September 2014, including as the first elected president of the Islamic Repub ...
government, and that he had been a covert operative for a US intelligence officer he knew only as "Mark".
Formerly secret Joint Task Force Guantanamo assessment
On April 25, 2011, whistleblower organization WikiLeaks
WikiLeaks () is an international Nonprofit organization, non-profit organisation that published news leaks and classified media provided by anonymous Source (journalism), sources. Julian Assange, an Australian Internet activism, Internet acti ...
published formerly secret assessments drafted by Joint Task Force Guantanamo
Joint Task Force Guantanamo (JTF-GTMO) is a U.S. military joint task force based at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, Guantánamo Bay, Cuba on the southeastern end of the base. JTF-GTMO falls under US Southern Command. Since January 2002 the command has ...
analysts.[
][
]
WikiLeaks published an 11-page Joint Task Force Guantanamo assessment that had been drafted on January 28, 2008.[
]
The assessment was signed by camp commandant Mark H. Buzby
Mark Howard Buzby (born October 6, 1956) is a retired United States Navy rear admiral who served as the Administrator of the United States Maritime Administration.
He retired from the Navy in 2013 and joined Carnival Cruise Line's Safety & Reli ...
, who recommended continued detention.
Guantanamo Joint Task Force review
When he assumed office in January 2009, President
President most commonly refers to:
*President (corporate title)
*President (education), a leader of a college or university
*President (government title)
President may also refer to:
Automobiles
* Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ful ...
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...
made a number of promises about the future of Guantanamo.[
][
][
] He promised the use of torture would cease at the camp. He promised to institute a new review system. That new review system was composed of officials from six departments, where the OARDEC reviews were conducted entirely by the Department of Defense. When it reported back a year later, the Joint Review Task Force
The Guantanamo Review Task Force was created by Executive Order 13492 issued by President of the United States Barack Obama on January 22, 2009, his second full day in office. United States Attorney General Eric Holder announced Matthew G. Olsen a ...
classified some individuals as too dangerous to be transferred from Guantanamo, even though there was no evidence to justify laying charges against them. On April 9, 2013, that document was made public after a Freedom of Information Act Freedom of Information Act may refer to the following legislations in different jurisdictions which mandate the national government to disclose certain data to the general public upon request:
* Freedom of Information Act 1982, the Australian act
* ...
request.[
]
Mohammed Nabi Omari was one of the 71 individuals deemed too innocent to charge, but too dangerous to release.
Although Obama promised that those deemed too innocent to charge, but too dangerous to release would start to receive reviews from a Periodic Review Board The Periodic Review Boards administrate a US ''"administrative procedure"'' for recommending whether certain individuals held in the Guantanamo Bay detention camps, in Cuba are safe to release or transfer, or whether they should continue to be held ...
. Less than a quarter of men have received a review.
Transfer negotiations and post-hoc criticisms
Negotiations over exchanging Bowe Bergdahl for five Guantanamo went on for years.[ After the exchange, and after Bergdahl was charged with desertion, critics claimed the Obama did not inform Congress in advance, and so the transfer was illegal.][
Critics claimed the men were likely to, certain to, or had already "re-engaged with terrorism"—even before their first year of house arrest was over. On May 31, 2015, '']The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' quoted a State Department official who insisted on anonymity that Qatar had unofficially "agreed to maintain the current restrictive conditions".[ They reported that this further restriction would last for at least six months, while negotiations were finalized.
]
References
External links
Who Are the Remaining Prisoners in Guantánamo? Part Eight: Captured in Afghanistan (2002-07)
Andy Worthington
The Guantánamo Files: Website Extras (11) – The Last of the Afghans (Part One) and Six “Ghost Prisoners”
Andy Worthington
{{DEFAULTSORT:Omari, Mohammad Nabi
Detainees of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp
Afghan extrajudicial prisoners of the United States
Living people
1968 births
People from Khost