By REBECCA TORR
Published: 10th August 2007
RELEASED Bahraini Guantanamo Bay detainee Isa Al Murbati will be given a comprehensive health and psychological programme to rehabilitate and integrate him back into the community, it was announced yesterday.
MP Mohammed Khalid said he and other MPs were speaking with government authorities to discuss how best to help Mr Al Murbati recover from the ordeal.
“We have organised a special meeting with the higher authorities to discuss his future,” Shaikh Mohammed told the GDN yesterday.
“Of course we would like to bring him to the normal Bahraini life, but at the moment he needs to be with his family.
By REBECCA TORR
Published: 10th August 2007
RELEASED Bahraini Guantanamo Bay detainee Isa Al Murbati will be given a comprehensive health and psychological programme to rehabilitate and integrate him back into the community, it was announced yesterday.
MP Mohammed Khalid said he and other MPs were speaking with government authorities to discuss how best to help Mr Al Murbati recover from the ordeal.
“We have organised a special meeting with the higher authorities to discuss his future,” Shaikh Mohammed told the GDN yesterday.
“Of course we would like to bring him to the normal Bahraini life, but at the moment he needs to be with his family.
“We are happy that he’s back and would like to help him and his family.”
Mr Al Murbati, aged 41, returned to Bahrain on Wednesday after being held in the notorious prison camp since 2001 without charge or trial. He and his wife Elham Ebrahim Khalil have five children – Fatima, 18, Ali, 17, Hafsa, 14, Omar, nine and Ebrahim, seven.
Mr Al Murbati’s lawyers reported several times during his detention that he was barely able to sleep or talk to other prisoners, because of cruel US military tactics.
Dr Redha Ali Ebrahim said the Bahrain Human Rights Society’s Al Karama Centre for Treatment and Rehabilitation of Torture Victims, which he heads, would provide Mr Al Murbati with rehabilitation if he and the family wished.
Dr Ebrahim, who worked with victims of torture, said Mr Al Murbati like others would need to be physically and psychologically assessed and then a plan for his rehabilitation into regular life could be set.
“Some victims may have physical pain or have some disability such as a fractured arm and many physical torture problems heal within a set period, but if they have psychological problems the healing process can take a long time,” he explained.
“It depends on his (Mr Al Murbati’s) mental and physical strength on how long it will take for him to recover and psychological problems are usually harder to get over than physical.
“If someone has been confined to a two by two metre cell for three to four years, all alone, and only allowed to go to the bathroom once a day, they will end up speaking to themselves.
“The psychological aftermath can also be to the family and sometimes they need help.”
Mr Al Murbati was taken to Guantanamo Bay after being captured fleeing Afghanistan as it came under bombing from the US and coalition troops in December 2001. The US government accused him of travelling from Bahrain to Afghanistan one month earlier to fight coalition forces.
It is claimed he first went to Kandahar and then to Kabul to be trained in how to use AK-47 rifle.
Mr Al Murbati was also said to have been affiliated with the separatist group Abu Sayyaf, whose members allegedly met in the Philippines to discuss channelling money to Arabs in Afghanistan. However, this was strongly denied by his family, who said he had gone to Pakistan for charity work.
Bahrain Human Rights Society assistant secretary-general Dr Abdulla Al Durazi said victims of torture could continue to suffer from nightmares, depression and sense of not being accepted by society, long after the abuse. “He may feel he is in isolation and will have nightmares, so he needs professional help,” he explained.
© Gulf Daily News
