ArticlesReader.com Menu
Newest Articles
Most Viewed Articles
ArticlesReader.com RSS
Submit Article
Login
Signup
Search the articles

Articles Main Categories
Advice
Animals
Automobiles
Business
Career
Communications
Computer Programming
Computers
Entertainment
Environment
Family
Fashion
Finance
Food
Health & Medical
Home & Garden
Humor
Internet Business
Internet Marketing
Legal
Leisure & Recreation
Marketing
Other
Politics
Reference & Education
Religion
Self Improvement
Sports
Technology & Science
Travel
Writing
Subscribe
Receive alert message from us when new articles submitted to our site for free.

Enter your name

Enter your email

Syndicate

















Related Products
Home::Politics

Moazzam Begg - Guantanamo Bay

Author : Birmingham UK Com
Channel 4 ( UK )paid Moazzam Begg an undisclosed sum to attend an interview to discuss his imprisonment in Guantanamo Bay which was aired at 7pm on 24th February 2004. Begg, one of nine British men who were held at the military camp in Cuba, was released on 25th January 2005 along with Feroz Abbasi, Martin Mubanga and Richard Belmar. Five others were released in March.

Moazzam Begg from Sparkbrook has admitted that he did attend training camps in Afghanistan in 2001 in order to teach as a charity worker at a school. However, this was not the first time that Begg had travelled abroad to war torn hot spots. He has openly admitted to supporting the Chechnyan rebels which might raise some eyebrows and memories of Beslan.

Begg was seized in September 2001 by the CIA. Whilst captive at Guantanamo Bay he signed a statement admitting to financial payments with possible connections to Al-Qaeda. His family claim that this is a case of mistaken identity. This statement could have been signed under duress. No access to legal representatives was allowed by the US authorities who regard the prisoners as detainees of a war against terrorism and therefore outside the jurisdiction of normal USA law and rights.

After his arrest in Islamabad Begg was held at Bagram Airbase for about a year before his transfer to Guantanamo Bay where Begg claims he was treated badly and witnessed torture and two possible deaths whilst in captivity. Claims that he was tied up, a sack placed over his head and then kicked and beaten were made all the more confusing by his statement claiming that the US did not actually torture him personally.

This story raises a number of important issues. Firstly, Begg was already under surveillance and attracting the attention of the British Government as early as 1998. He was arrested in 2000 under British anti-terrorism laws during a raid on his Islamic Bookshop in Birmingham. Moazzam Begg, by his own admission has met several extremist muslim clerics such as Abu Hamza, cheeleader for Osama bin Laden. Begg was quick to point out that he did not necessarily agree with all their views but was not specific and neither did he deny that he had instigated a meeting with them.

Just what makes a man take his family and children to a troubled country, visit terrorist training camps and then end up getting embroiled in a war, the end result of which he finds himself in prison for three years? Moazzam Begg has to a great extent controlled his own destiny. Whilst claiming to be as British as you and I he has clearly set his loyalties in his religion rather than his country. You and I, and the majority of British Asians would not have rushed off to Pakistan on a mission.

Moazzam Begg might have received more sympathy if he had not charged Channel 4 to be interviewed. Considering that this is the same man that wanted to be left alone to recover from psychological trauma he did come across as very calculating and calm in his narrative. Many reasons for his actions seem to have been intentionally omitted. If Begg had intended to seek sympathy and understanding for his actions then this clearly failed. His explanation raises more questions than answers.

If what Moazzam Begg has confirmed about torture and ill treatment of prisoners is correct, then the USA has a huge moral obligation to put its house in order and clarify the position with regard to prisoners held in no mans land in Cuba. International law dictates that people deserve better than this whatever their crime. The day the world accepts intimidation and imprisonment without justice as the norm, is a day we must all strive to make sure will not happen internationally. The US government needs to address this issue in order to re establish its credibility and long standing tradition of freedom and justice for all.

Moazzam Begg was released by the Americans under the guarantee that he would be monitored by UK authorities and his right to travel outside the UK would be withdrawn.

About the Author

You must display the text 'Content Provided by www.birminghamuk.com' in order to use this article. This article is UK bias but we invite people from the USA to give their opinion and comments.

Spam emails More free articles

Related articles


  1. Anarchy: Law, Order, and Authority
  2. Internet in Russia and Ukraine - Part 1. General Information and Statistics
  3. Rule of Thumb For Exporting Technology
  4. Increasing Evaporation in Ocean to Defeat Droughts
  5. The New Goo Review is Coming Right At You
  6. So How Far Have We Come? Here are some of the 2001 Anti Terrorist Projects
  7. Using a Meteor Shower as Decoy for ICBM Attack
  8. Stopping a Nuclear Bomb on a Hydrofoil
  9. Harmonic Beams to Pre-Detonate Shoulder Launched Surface to Air Missiles
  10. Defending Middle Eastern Oil Refineries and Assets
  11. Technology and International Terrorism
  12. Screening Trucks and Containers Coming Into Our Country
  13. Let me throw out a random thought on Homeland Security Leadership Structure
  14. Tracking Over The Road Trucks from Canada
  15. What are the benefits of Nuclear War again; I must have missed that point?
  16. Chinese Military Build Up - Sun Tzu and Chinese War Machine
  17. Cloaking Giant Airships is Possible, Why Stop There?
  18. Canning International Terrorists? Literally
  19. Self Destruct Strategies in UAV Construction
  20. UAV Decoy Stategies, Theories and The Modern Art of War
  21. UAV Materials and Thoughts on New Technologies and Keeping Up With Our Opponents
  22. UAV Targets, Aerial Dog Fights, Interception, Future of War Intelligence
  23. Anglo-Israelism and the Flesh
  24. Israel Termed A ‘Nuclear Power’ By US Officials
  25. Another Round of EU-Iran Talks Starts April 10 - Will Iran Be Referred To The UN Security Council?
More related feeds
Feesabilillah
The tribunals used for putting suspects on trial at Guantanamo Bay are a "stain on America's military", a former military prosecutor has told the BBC in his first interview since resigning. For Lt Col Darrel Vandeveld, a devout Catholic ...

Moazzam Begg - Guantanamo Bay
Channel 4 ( UK )paid Moazzam Begg an undisclosed sum to attend an interview to discuss his imprisonment in Guantanamo Bay which was aired at 7pm on 24th February 2004. Begg, one of nine British men who were held at the military camp in ...

Harry’s Place » Victoria Brittain Is a Disgrace
Most famously, she ghost wrote the biography of Moazzam Begg, whose involvement in jihadism stretches back to 1994. The thesis of the Brittain/Begg book can be summed up in one sentence, which should have been its title: ...

Nouse.co.uk » It’s better late than never for Guantanamo
Archbishop attacks Guantanamo Bay following UN human rights report · Enemy Combatant: A British Muslim’s Journey to Guantanamo and Back, Moazzam Begg (with Victoria Brittain) · California backtracks on gay marriage bill · Abduction, ...

Agents deal in passion, not per cent; THE WEEK IN BOOKS
Emma Thompson and Sandi Toksvig feature; but so do the chefs Samuel and Samantha Clarke; the dancer Deborah Bull, and a former inmate of Guantánamo Bay, Moazzam Begg. And so, of course, does Julian Barnes. A glance at the bereft and ...

Book Review: My Story: the tale of a terrorist who wasn't
Begg, Moazzam (2006): "Enemy Combatant: my imprisonment at Guantanamo, Bagram and Kandahar", New York: New Press. Grey, Stephen (2007): "Ghost Plane: the true story of the CIA torture program", Melbourne: Scribe. ...

Ex-Guantanamo Bay detainee tells his story | Tell Obama Online
downrodeo85 asked: Since January 2002, the US has released just over 260 prisoners from Guantanamo Bay. One of them is Moazzam Begg, a British national who grew.

Guantanamo Bay
This is Moazzam Begg, British national from Birmingham who spent a year as a prisoner in Bagram in Afghanistan and a further two years in Guantanamo Bay before being released without charge.

Another Ramadan "N" Guantanamo
An ex Guantanamo prisoner speaks on Ramadan in Guantanamo Bay : by Moazzam Begg 29/09/2008. It’s almost seven years since the notorious images depicting kneeling Muslim men attired in the signature orange clothing of Camp X-Ray, ...

Thursday 16 October: Moazzam Begg talk about War on Terror ...
Moazzam Begg, bestselling author of “Enemy Combatant” and former Guantanamo Bay detainee, will speak at the University on the “War on Terror, Islamophobia and Civil Liberties”. Date/Time: Thursday 16th September @ 6.30PM ...

 

 

© 2007 articlesreader.com - All Rights Reserved