Guantanamo Bay is a hellish detention camp reserved for alleged terrorists and war criminals.
Here are 10 surprising facts you may not have known about the place..
Number 10: Guantanamo Bay is Cuban land leased to the US
How exactly does the US operate a prison and military camp on the lands and shores of its
unfriendly communist neighbor?
The answer lies way back to over 100 years ago.
Following the Spanish-American War in the late 19th Century, Cuba came under United
States rule.
The country was later granted independence, albeit remaining under American influence.
This also came with an agreement of having 46.8 square miles of land and water at Cuba's
Guantanamo Bay leased to the United States.
This piece of land has remained occupied by the US army even after Fidel Castro, who aggressively
opposed the US government, took over Cuba in an armed revolt in 1959.
The US government to this day still pays Cuba 4,085 dollars each month, but Castro had never
cashed the checks out of protest.
The lease however, can only be terminated by mutual agreement from both sides.
In 2002, following the 9/11 attacks and subsequent military operation in Afghanistan, President
George Bush repurposed Guantanamo's facilities into a prison camp to hold detainees in the
"war on terror".
Number 9: It is the most expensive prison in the world
It is reported that the United States government spends 800 thousand dollars a year of taxpayers'
money on every single detainee in Guantanamo.
This is 30 times more than what is spent on an average prisoner on US soil, which is just
25,000 dollars.
The figure is also more than the cost of any college degree in the USA.
The daily meal of a Guantanamo captive alone costs roughly 40 dollars a day, which is 5
times the average American.
About 2000 soldiers and civilian staff are stationed at Guantanamo to maintain the facility
and guard the prisoners.
With the now diminishing number of detainees, the ratio of detainee to staff member is 1
to 25, meaning the place is severely overstaffed.
The facilities at Guantanamo include a 28,000 square foot recreational space complete with
a soccer field and gravel track.
The project was constructed in 2012, reportedly costing 744,000 dollars due to importing equipment
to the base.
A Texas company was awarded a 35 million dollar project to build a fiber optic cable running
between Florida and Guantanamo in order to improve the base's internet connections.
Overall, the cost to operate the base is over 400 million dollars a year, and over 5 billion
dollars has been spent since the detention camp first opened.
Number 8: Inmates are subject to brutal interrogations and torture methods
Since the Guantanamo Bay Detention Center was first opened, torture had become endemic
in the form of psychological and physical abuse.
The various methods of torture used by the US military include sound and light manipulation,
sleep deprivation, water boarding, humiliating acts, solitary confinement, temperature extremes,
and stress positions.
Many released detainees have told stories of how they endured regular beatings, prolonged
hood wearing, forced injections, dog attacks, and many other forms of mistreatment during
their imprisonment.
The abuse has even extended to non-prisoners.
In 2003, a member of the US Air Force named Sean Baker was ordered to play the role of
a captive in a training drill.
Wearing an orange prison jumpsuit, other soldiers thought he was a real detainee, and had him
severely beaten to the point where he suffered a brain injury and seizures.
This forced him into an involuntary medical retirement from the Army.
While the entire torture program was severe under the Bush administration, some of the
brutal forms of interrogation practices have ended under Obama, to a certain degree.
Number 7: Other forms of abuse Medical professionals working in Guantanamo
bay were ordered to ignore ethical standards when it came to abusive interrogation methods.
This included ignoring vital signs, and using medical information for interrogation purposes.
In a way, the health professionals themselves became accessories to the inhumane treatment
of detainees, and were in violation of World Medical Association prohibitions.
Female interrogators were said to resort to sexual abuse in order to break the conservative
religious detainees.
A female official was said to slip her hand into her pants and smear what looked like
menstrual blood on prisoners, causing the handcuffed prisoners to scream and sob in
disgust.
Released prisoners have also reported incidents of religious abuse.
Apart from verbal remarks, the abuse came in the form of defacing the Quran by tearing
its pages, flushing them down the toilet, and denying any of its copies to the prisoners.
Number 6: Fate of the detainees In all, 779 men have been detained in Guantanamo
Bay since its establishment in 2002.
50 different nationalities have been present in the camp, with Afghans being the largest
group, followed by Saudi Arabians, Yemenis, Pakistanis, and Algerians.
According to sources from Wikileaks, minors have also been brought to the camp.
About 15 detainees were under the age of 18, which is a violation of international law.
The youngest, one Omar Khadr, was only 15.
The oldest was Mohammed Sadiq, who was 89 when he was transferred to Afghanistan from
Guantanamo.
Guantanamo Bay is known for containing "high value prisoners".
This includes Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, high ranking Al-Qaeda leader who is believed to
be the architect of 9/11; and Ramzi Bin Al-Shibh, an alleged would-be hijacker of one of the
planes that crashed into the World Trade Center.
The top 14 high valued figures in Guantanamo are still yet to be charged with a war crime.
It is found that some prisoners have been extradited to other countries for interrogation
and torture before being brought to Guantanamo.
Over 85% of detainees were released without charges after years of incarceration.
These people would go on to receive little to no compensation for the inhumane treatment
they received.
A much known case is that of the "Tipton Three", British citizens who suffered two years of
detention in Guantanamo, whose experiences were documented in the film "Road to Guantanamo".
All of their attempts to sue the US government have been dismissed.
Number 5: Suicide attempts by prisoners is rampant
There have been 6 suicide cases of Guantanamo prisoners that have been officially reported,
although defense lawyers believe the real figure is higher.
The US Department of Defense has changed the way they classify the suicide attempts, calling
them "self injurious behaviors" instead.
The first successful suicides were in 2006, when three prisoners killed themselves in
a suicide pact.
The suicides accounted for the first inmate deaths in the detainment camp.
However, suicide attempts had begun since the place was first established in 2002, and
US officials initially ignored reporting the cases.
Increased incidents are observed to coincide with the severity of interrogation techniques
used by military and CIA officers.
Several investigation and news agencies assert that based on accounts by former Guantanamo
guards, it is likely that a cover-up has been initiated.
Some inmates may have died from torture during interrogation.
Including the six suicide cases mentioned, so far the total number of official deaths
of detainees while in custody in Guantanamo is nine.
Number 4: Hunger Strikes In Guantanamo bay, prisoners often undertake
massive hunger strikes to protest against their mistreatment.
With the help of medical personnel, guards often dealt with the problem by force feeding
the ones on strike.
Large feeding tubes were forcibly shoved into prisoners' noses and down their stomachs.
No sedatives were provided in the painful procedure, and same tubes were used repeatedly
for different patients.
The United Nations has declared force feeding as a violation of international law.
It was officially defined as torture by the UN Human Rights Council in 2006.
In 2013, over 100 detainees undertook a widespread hunger strike together.
This was deemed as an act of desperation, as many of them had been detained for over
a decade without trial.
Tariq Ba Odah, a Saudi detainee had been on a hunger strike for almost a decade, and was
force fed the whole time.
He was finally transferred to Saudi authorities in April 2016.
Number 3: Even memories of detainees are classified by the CIA
It is normal for governments to have certain information classified, as they could pose
a threat to national security.
This usually involves something that exists like a document, or a piece of paper.
But the CIA has taken this a step further, having made memories of prisoners at Guantanamo
Bay a state secret.
Until quite recently, all their memories since they were taken under CIA custody were classified
as state secrets.
This was shown when Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, alleged planner of the 9/11 attacks was on
trial with four others in 2008.
They were informed beforehand not to reveal anything they experienced inside Guantanamo
Bay because their memories contained information about US interrogation methods.
This extreme measure of secrecy has received widespread criticism and backlash from ACLU
and human rights groups.
A Senate Intelligence Committee report from 2014 detailing the military's enhanced interrogation
skills has caused the government to ease its rule.
This report managed to cut through the US government's original argument, and lawyers
can now submit testimony for declassification.
Number 2: Obama has tried repeatedly to close Guantanamo Bay
Barack Obama has stated his intention of closing Guantanamo Bay's detention center since his
first presidential campaign in 2008.
On the very second day of his presidency, he signed an executive order to have the place
shut down.
However, efforts to close the facility and move terror suspects to prisons on US soil
have been hampered repeatedly by the Republicans who dominate Congress.
However, conditions and treatments of prisoners have somewhat improved under the Obama administration,
and the number of detainees have been reduced to less than 100.
Still, Obama's two terms have come to an end without him accomplishing one of the main
things he sought to do from the beginning.
Number 1: Many remaining inmates have actually been cleared for release
Most Guantanamo detainees have been authorized by a presidential task force for release,
or to be transferred to the US or another nation to be trialed.
Despite this, they have still remained in the hellish prison camp for years due to opposition
from Congress.
As of now, more than half of remaining inmates are cleared for release or transfer.
Part of the reason is that many of the men are from Yemen, a country that has a large
al-Qaida problem, as well as harboring many other extremist militant groups.
Repatriation of the prisoners might lead to their eventual release and joining into these
groups.
Some could be potentially transferred to US soil into the country's many supermax prisons
and military sites.
But many republicans suggest that the act would only threaten the nation's security.
So far, there are reportedly 57 countries to which prisoners have been transferred to,
with most of them going to their native countries.
The majority goes to Afghanistan.
Russia has received a few detainees, and has allegedly treated them unfairly with torture
and sham trials.
Some Middle Eastern countries offer transferred detainees a proper rehab which includes religious
counseling to pacify their extremist ideologies.
Still, a number of prisoners have been reported to return to militant activities upon their
release.
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