The same judge who denied the habeas petition for Yasin Ismail last week, Judge Henry H. Kennedy, Jr. of the U.S. District Court, Washington, DC, approved the petition for a different prisoner, Uthman Abdul Rahim Mohammed Uthman, primarily because the evidence against him had been produced by torture. The two tortured “witnesses” against Uthman were presumed al-Qaida members, also held at Guantanamo, Sharqwi Abdu Ali Al-Hajj and Sanad Yislam Ali Al Kazimi. This brings the scorecard to 35 of 48 habeas cases from Guantanamo decided against the government. I don’t know how many of them were due to tortured evidence.

Andy Worthington, who has conscientiously and effectively documented the fates of hundreds of prisoners held at the U.S. prison at Guantanamo has posted a “Habeas Corpus Scorecard” at his website. His first entry in the series considers the case of Yasin Qasem Muhammad Ismail, a Yemeni who was captured (or sold to U.S. forces) in Afghanistan in 2001.

A new UN report notes secret detentions “might reach the threshold of a crime against humanity.” Obama’s OLC braintrusts the Detention Task Force’s recommendation of indefinite detention of some Guantanamo prisoners. These actions make sense in the light of a 55 year old report on CIA covert actions.

The set-up of Abu Zubaydah as an Al Qaeda bigwig may have been meant, among other things, for use in intimidation and torture of other prisoners. Andy Worthington recounts how a prisoner captured with Zubaydah, Omar Gharmesh, reported to another prisoner in Syria’s infamous Palestine Branch prison, where they were sent via “extraordinary rendition,” that [...]