BBC Conducts Exclusive Interview With Very Credible Detainee At Guantanimo

The BBC is reporting that it has conducted an exclusive interview with a Kuwaiti detainee at Guantanamo through his lawyer.

[a] Kuwaiti man being held at Guantanamo Bay gave a rare interview to the BBC in which he described the force-feeding of hunger strikers at the camp, something which he says amounts to torture.

Answering the questions from the BBC's Today Programme through his lawyer, Fawzi al-Odah said hunger strikers were strapped to a chair and force-fed through a tube three times a day.

"First they took my comfort items away from me. You know, my blanket, my towel, my long pants, then my shoes. I was put in isolation for 10 days.

"They came in and read out an order. It said if you refuse to eat, we will put you on the chair [for force feeding]."

Mr Odah, who has been held at the base since 2002, was one of 84 inmates at Guantanamo who went on hunger strike in December. Just four are still refusing food.

He told how detainees were given "formulas" to force them to empty their bowels and were strapped to a metal chair three times a day, where a tube was inserted to administer food.

"One guy, a Saudi, told me that he had once been tortured in Saudi Arabia and that this metal chair treatment was worse than any torture he had ever endured or could imagine," Mr Odah said.

The UN Human Rights Commission said recently that it regarded force-feeding at Guantanamo as a form of torture, a charge the US firmly has repeatedly denied.

Wow, this force feeding has to be bad stuff. They must be making them eat asparagus or something.

Hat tip to Drudge.