My Guantanamo Diary The Detainees and the Stories They Told Me

by Khan, Mahvish

• ISBN13: 9781586487072
• ISBN10: 1586487078
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2009-06-23
• Publisher: PublicAffairs

Summary

Mahvish Khan is the only Afghan-American to walk into Guantanamo of her own accord. This unique book is her story, and the story of the men she grew to know uniquely well inside the cages of Guantanamo. Mahvish Khan is an American lawyer, born to immigrant Afghan parents. She was outraged that her country, the USA, seemed to have suspended its tradition of equality for all under the law with regard to those imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, and so she volunteered to translate for the lawyers - including British lawyer and founder of Reprieve Clive Stafford Smith - acting pro bono for the prisoners. Because she spoke their language, understood their customs and brought them Starbucks chai, the closest available drink to the kind of tea they would drink at home, they quickly befriended her, offering fatherly advice as well as a uniquely personal insight into their plight, and that of their families thousands of miles away at home. Some at Guantanamo are terrorists who deserve to be convicted and sentenced as such. Some are paediatricians and school teachers. We cannot tell the difference until we see them as individuals with their own unique stories. They deserve that much. No other writer has had access to the detainees. This book is a testament to their captivity. It documents the voices of men who have been tortured and held in a black hole of indefinite detention without legal recourse for years. It shows who they are and also allows readers to see that these men are more similar to us than they are different.

Author Biography

Mahvish Rukhsana Khan is a recent law school graduate and journalist. She has published in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and other media. She lives in San Diego.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. ix
Author's Note	p. xi
Prologue	p. xiii
Secret Clearance	p. 1
The Pediatrician	p. 13
Getting There	p. 31
The Old Man	p. 41
Big Bounties	p. 55
The Goatherd	p. 65
The Lawyers	p. 83
The Businessman	p. 99
Afghanistan	p. 109
Kabul	p. 133
Dead Detainees	p. 153
Habeas Hurdles	p. 167
Sami Al-Haj	p. 179
The Drama	p. 197
Jumah Al-Dossary	p. 207
What The Pentagon Said	p. 227
The Police Chief	p. 235
The Poets	p. 249
Serial Numbers	p. 261
Epilogue	p. 279
Notes	p. 297
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