Karam Khamis Sayd Khamsan

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Karam Khamis Sayd Khamsan is a citizen of Yemen, held in extrajudicial detention in the United States Guantanamo Bay detainment camps, in Cuba.^[1] His detainee ID number is 586.

1 Combatant Status Review Tribunal
- 1.1 allegations
- 1.2 testimony
2 Determined not to have been an Enemy Combatant
3 References

[edit] Combatant Status Review Tribunal

Initially the Bush administration asserted that they could withhold all the protections of the Geneva Conventions to captives from the war on terror. This policy was challenged before the Judicial branch. Critics argued that the USA could not evade its obligation to conduct a competent tribunals to determine whether captives are, or are not, entitled to the protections of prisoner of war status.

Subsequently the Department of Defense instituted the Combatant Status Review Tribunals. The Tribunals, however, were not authorized to determine whether the captives were lawful combatants -- rather they were merely empowered to make a recommendation as to whether the captive had previously been correctly determined to match the Bush administration's definition of an enemy combatant.

Khamsan chose to participate in his Combatant Status Review Tribunal.^[2]

[edit] allegations

The allegations that Khamsan faced during his Tribunal were:^[2]

a. The detainee is associated with al Qaida and/or the Taliban.

The detainee traveled to Afghanistan in 2001.
The detainee was given airline tickets to Karachi, Pakistan.
The detainee had his passport altered after he was denied boarding on an airplane bound for Pakistan.
The detainee's travel facilitator lived in Sana'a, Yemen.
The travel facilitator's support to the detainee mirrors that of a known al Qaida and/or Taliban recruiter.

[edit] testimony

Khamsan acknowledged that he was given an airline ticket from his friend Tarek Mohammed. He denied his passport was altered. He said his passport was a brand new, newly issued one.

Khamsan said that his friend Tarek was a drug dealer. Khamsan said that his role in Tarek's enterprises was to travel to Afghanistan to serve as a hostage.

Khamsan said this trip was his first experience with the illegal drug trade. He was going to be paid 50,000 Riyals for his role, which he planned to use to finance his marraige.

[edit] Determined not to have been an Enemy Combatant

The Washington Post reports that Khamsan was one of 38 detainees who was determined not to have been an enemy combatant during his Combatant Status Review Tribunal.^[3] They report that Khamsan has been released.