User:Geo Swan/working/Algerian six

I started this subpage a long time ago, before I knew it was possible to simply move subpages in user space to article space. I started an article, in article space, based on this subpage. I could request {{db-author}} on this. Alternately I believe it is not unreasonable for me to request a history merge. I will soon request a history merge.

The Algerian six were a group of men, born in Algeria, living in Bosnia, captured in the United States "Global war on Terror". All but one of these men had become Bosnian citizens. All six became aid workers.

Lakhdar Boumediene, Boudella El Hadj, Sabir Mahfouz Lahmar, Bensayah Belkacem

Arrest, trial and acquital, by Bosnian legal authorities

In October 2001, approxomately one month after the attacks of September 11 2001 American Security officials in Bosnia became alarmed. American Security officials, working in the American embassy in Sarajevo, who monitored the "chatter" of those suspected of involvement in terrorism thought they had noticed a change that signalled an impending attack on the American embassy.

Bosnian authorities arrested the "Algerian six" on October 21, 2001, charged with plotting to bomb the American embassy. The six had their trial in January , 2002, before the Bosnian Supreme Court, and were acquitted.

Capture by American security officials

According to their testimony before their Combatant Status Review Tribunals, the six were released, and immediately captured by Bosnian and American security officials. As with "extraordinary renditions" they weren't charged with any crimes by local authorities. And, according to their testimony, they were transported out of the country without any formal requests for extradition, or for their lawyers to file a habeas corpus. The six men were transported to the American naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

According to their testimony before their Combatant Status Reviews their interrogators were uninterested

A note on sources

This article relies on the dossiers compiled by the US on the detainees while they were in Guantanamo Bay, and subsequently released through Freedom of Information Act requests. Those documents were released in portable document format, are long, and in hard to read.

External links

• Qaeda Suspect´s Bosnian Wife Says He´s No Terrorist , reprint from New York Times, January 28, 2002
• Bosnian protest over Guantanamo, BBC, January 31, 2005