Dilawar
Encyclopedia
Dilawar also known as Dilawar of Yakubi, was an Afghan
taxi driver who was tortured to death at the Bagram Collection Point, a US military detention center in Afghanistan
.
He arrived at the prison on December 5, 2002, and was declared dead 5 days later. His death was declared a homicide
and investigated and prosecuted in the Bagram torture and prisoner abuse
trials. The award winning documentary Taxi to the Dark Side
focuses on the murder of Dilawar.
taxi
driver and farmer from the small village of Yakubi
in the Khost Province
of Afghanistan, who was 5 in 9 in (1.75 m) tall, and weighed only 122 pounds (55.3 kg). Dilawar was transporting 3 passengers in his taxi, when he and his passengers were arrested at a checkpoint. The four men were detained and turned over to American soldiers who transferred them to the Bagram Theater Internment Facility
. His passengers, like Abdul Rahim
and Zakim Shah reported to have experienced similar treatment as Dilawar but they survived Bagram and were later flown to the Guantanamo Bay detention camps.
At Bagram, Dilawar was chained to the ceiling of his cell, suspended by his wrists for four days. His arms were dislocated from their sockets, and flapped around limply, whenever guards collected him for interrogation. During his detention, Dilawar's legs were beaten to a pulp and an amputation would have been necessary. He is survived by his wife, and daughter, Bibi Rashida.
The various accounts of torture
have been detailed as follows:
The New York Times
reported that:
On the day of his death, Dilawar had been chained by the wrists to the top of his cell for much of the previous four days. A guard tried to force the young man to his knees. But his legs, which had been pummeled by guards for several days, could no longer bend. An interrogator told Mr. Dilawar that he could see a doctor after they finished with him. When he was finally sent back to his cell, though, the guards were instructed only to chain the prisoner back to the ceiling. "Leave him up," one of the guards quoted Specialist Claus as saying. Several hours passed before an emergency room doctor finally saw Mr. Dilawar. By then he was dead, his body beginning to stiffen
. It would be many months before Army investigators learned that most of the interrogators had in fact believed Mr. Dilawar to be an innocent man who simply drove his taxi past the American base at the wrong time.
Leaked internal United States Army
documentation, a death certificate dated 13. December 2002, ruled that his death was due to a direct result of assaults and attacks he sustained at the hands of interrogators of the 519th Military Intelligence Battalion
of the US army during his stay at Bagram
. The document was signed by Lt. Col. Elizabeth A. Rouse of the Air Force, a pathologist with the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology
in Washington DC, and listed as its finding that the "mode of death" was "homicide," and not "natural," "accident" and "suicide" and that the cause of death was "blunt-force injuries to lower extremities complicating coronary artery disease".
A subsequent autopsy revealed that his legs had been "pulpified," and that even if Dilawar had survived, it would have been necessary to amputate his legs.
According to the death certificate
shown in the documentary Taxi to the Dark Side
, the box marked Homicide
had been checked as the ultimate cause of death. however, the military
had so far publicly claimed that Dilawar had died from natural causes
. It was only by accident that the death certificate was leaked, when New York Times reporter named Carlotta Gall managed to track down Dilawar's family in Yakubi, where Dilawar's brother, Shahpoor, showed her a folded paper, he had received with Dilawar's body. He could not read because it was in English. It was the death certificate.
him. Wells was subsequently sentenced to two months in a military prison
. Two other soldiers convicted in connection with the case escaped custodial sentences. The sentences were criticized by Human Rights Watch
.
In March 2006, the CBS
News program, "60 Minutes
" investigated the deaths of two Afghan prisoners, including Dilawar, revealing that authorization for the abuse came from the "very top of the United States government". "60 Minutes" correspondent Scott Pelley interviewed retired Army Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, who was appointed chief of staff by Secretary of State Colin Powell
in 2002, during George W. Bush
’s first administration. Willie V. Brand, one of the soldiers convicted of assault and maiming in the deaths of the two prisoners, and Brand’s commanding officer, Capt. Christopher Beiring, were also featured in the program. Wilkerson told “60 Minutes” the he could “smell” a cover-up and was asked by Powell to investigate how American soldiers had come to use torture and stated; "I was developing the picture as to how this all got started in the first place, and that alarmed me as much as the abuse itself because it looked like authorization for the abuse went to the very top of the United States government". Brand and Beiring confirmed that several of their leaders had witnessed and knew about the abuse and torture of the prisoners.
Beiring and Brand showed no remorse when recounting the torture. Beiring was charged with dereliction of duty, a charge that was later dropped. Brand was convicted at his court martial, but rather than the 16 years in prison he was facing from the charges brought against him, he was given nothing more than a reduction in his rank.
In August 2005, Sgt. Selena M. Salcedo
, a female interrogator with the 519th Military Intelligence Battalion, admitted to mistreating Dilawar. In a military court Salcedo pleaded guilty to dereliction of duty and assault, admitting she kicked the prisoner, grabbed his head and forced him against a wall several times. Two related charges were dropped and she was reduced in rank to corporal or specialist, given a letter of reprimand and docked $250 a month in pay for four months. She could have gotten a year in prison, loss of a year’s pay, reduction in rank to private, and a bad-conduct discharge.
opened a civil inquiry into the Bagram abuse.
Alicia A. Caldwell, writing in the Huffington Post, quoted a former military defense lawyer, named Michael Waddington
, who said:
Duane M. Grubb, Darin Broady, Christopher Greatorex and Christopher Beiring, four of the GIs in who served at the centre at the time of the deaths, acknowledge that they had been called before the Grand Jury.
They were reported to have waived immunity.
Demography of Afghanistan
The population of Afghanistan is around 29,835,392 as of the year 2011, which is unclear if the refugees living outside the country are included or not. The nation is composed of a multi-ethnic and multi-lingual society, reflecting its location astride historic trade and invasion routes between...
taxi driver who was tortured to death at the Bagram Collection Point, a US military detention center in Afghanistan
Afghanistan
Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...
.
He arrived at the prison on December 5, 2002, and was declared dead 5 days later. His death was declared a homicide
Homicide
Homicide refers to the act of a human killing another human. Murder, for example, is a type of homicide. It can also describe a person who has committed such an act, though this use is rare in modern English...
and investigated and prosecuted in the Bagram torture and prisoner abuse
Bagram torture and prisoner abuse
In 2005, The New York Times obtained a 2,000-page United States Army report concerning the homicides of two unarmed civilian Afghan prisoners by U.S. armed forces in 2002 at the Bagram Theater Internment Facility in Bagram, Afghanistan. The prisoners, Habibullah and Dilawar, were chained to the...
trials. The award winning documentary Taxi to the Dark Side
Taxi to the Dark Side
Taxi to the Dark Side is a 2007 documentary film directed by American filmmaker Alex Gibney, and produced by Eva Orner and Susannah Shipman, which won the 2007 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature...
focuses on the murder of Dilawar.
Background
Dilawar was a 22-year-old PashtunPashtun people
Pashtuns or Pathans , also known as ethnic Afghans , are an Eastern Iranic ethnic group with populations primarily between the Hindu Kush mountains in Afghanistan and the Indus River in Pakistan...
taxi
Taxicab
A taxicab, also taxi or cab, is a type of vehicle for hire with a driver, used by a single passenger or small group of passengers, often for a non-shared ride. A taxicab conveys passengers between locations of their choice...
driver and farmer from the small village of Yakubi
Yakubi
Yakubi is the center of Sabari District in Khost Province, Afghanistan. It is located on at 1,113 m altitude in the southeastern part of the district....
in the Khost Province
Khost Province
Khost is one of the thirty-four provinces of Afghanistan. It is in the east of the country. Khost province used to be part of Paktia province in the past...
of Afghanistan, who was 5 in 9 in (1.75 m) tall, and weighed only 122 pounds (55.3 kg). Dilawar was transporting 3 passengers in his taxi, when he and his passengers were arrested at a checkpoint. The four men were detained and turned over to American soldiers who transferred them to the Bagram Theater Internment Facility
Bagram Theater Internment Facility
The Parwan Detention Facility , also called the Bagram Theater Internment Facility, is a United States-run prison located next to Bagram Airfield in the Parwan Province of Afghanistan.It was formerly known as the Bagram Collection Point...
. His passengers, like Abdul Rahim
Abdul Rahim (Guantanamo detainee 897)
-External links:* Andy Worthington...
and Zakim Shah reported to have experienced similar treatment as Dilawar but they survived Bagram and were later flown to the Guantanamo Bay detention camps.
At Bagram, Dilawar was chained to the ceiling of his cell, suspended by his wrists for four days. His arms were dislocated from their sockets, and flapped around limply, whenever guards collected him for interrogation. During his detention, Dilawar's legs were beaten to a pulp and an amputation would have been necessary. He is survived by his wife, and daughter, Bibi Rashida.
Arrest
The New York Times reported on May 20, 2005 that:
- Four days before, on the eve of the Muslim holiday of Id al-Fitr, Mr. Dilawar set out from his tiny village of Yakubi
YakubiYakubi is the center of Sabari District in Khost Province, Afghanistan. It is located on at 1,113 m altitude in the southeastern part of the district....
in a prized new possession, a used Toyota sedan that his family bought for him a few weeks earlier to drive as a taxi.
- On the day that he disappeared, Mr. Dilawar's mother had asked him to gather his three sisters from their nearby villages and bring them home for the holiday. However, he needed gas money and decided instead to drive to the provincial capital, Khost
KhostKhost or Khowst is a city in eastern Afghanistan. It is the capital of Khost province, which is a mountainous region near Afghanistan's border with Pakistan...
, about 45 minutes away, to look for fares.
- At a taxi stand there, he found three men headed back toward Yakubi. On the way, they passed a base used by American troops, Camp Salerno, which had been the target of a rocket attack that morning.
- Militiamen loyal to the guerrilla commander guarding the base, Jan Baz Khan, stopped the Toyota at a checkpoint. They confiscated a broken walkie-talkie from one of Mr. Dilawar's passengers. In the trunk, they found an electric stabilizer used to regulate current from a generator. (Mr. Dilawar's family said the stabilizer was not theirs; at the time, they said, they had no electricity at all.)
- The four men were detained and turned over to American soldiers at the base as suspects in the attack. Mr. Dilawar and his passengers spent their first night there handcuffed to a fence, so they would be unable to sleep. When a doctor examined them the next morning, he said later, he found Mr. Dilawar tired and suffering from headaches but otherwise fine.
- In February, an American military official disclosed that the Afghan guerrilla commander whose men had arrested Mr. Dilawar and his passengers had himself been detained. The commander, Jan Baz Khan, was suspected of attacking Camp Salerno himself and then turning over innocent "suspects" to the Americans in a ploy to win their trust, the military official said.
- The three passengers in Mr. Dilawar's taxi were sent home from Guantánamo in March 2004, 15 months after their capture, with letters saying they posed "no threat" to American forces.
Torture
Torture
Torture is the act of inflicting severe pain as a means of punishment, revenge, forcing information or a confession, or simply as an act of cruelty. Throughout history, torture has often been used as a method of political re-education, interrogation, punishment, and coercion...
have been detailed as follows:
- A black hood pulled over his head limiting his ability to breatheBreathingBreathing is the process that moves air in and out of the lungs. Aerobic organisms require oxygen to release energy via respiration, in the form of the metabolism of energy-rich molecules such as glucose. Breathing is only one process that delivers oxygen to where it is needed in the body and...
- KneeKneeThe knee joint joins the thigh with the leg and consists of two articulations: one between the fibula and tibia, and one between the femur and patella. It is the largest joint in the human body and is very complicated. The knee is a mobile trocho-ginglymus , which permits flexion and extension as...
strikes to the abdomenAbdomenIn vertebrates such as mammals the abdomen constitutes the part of the body between the thorax and pelvis. The region enclosed by the abdomen is termed the abdominal cavity... - Over 100 peronealCommon fibular nerveThe common fibular nerve , about one-half the size of the tibial nerve, is derived from the dorsal branches of the fourth and fifth lumbar and the first and second sacral nerves.It descends obliquely along the lateral side of the popliteal fossa to the head of the fibula,...
(a nerve behind the kneecap) strikes - Shoved against a wall
- Pulled by his beard
- His bare feet stepped on
- Kicks to the groinGroinIn human anatomy, the groin areas are the two creases at the junction of the torso with the legs, on either side of the pubic area. This is also known as the medial compartment of the thigh. A pulled groin muscle usually refers to a painful injury sustained by straining the hip adductor muscles...
- Chained to the ceiling for extended hours, depriving him of sleepSleep deprivationSleep deprivation is the condition of not having enough sleep; it can be either chronic or acute. A chronic sleep-restricted state can cause fatigue, daytime sleepiness, clumsiness and weight loss or weight gain. It adversely affects the brain and cognitive function. Few studies have compared the...
- Slammed his chest into a table front
The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
reported that:
On the day of his death, Dilawar had been chained by the wrists to the top of his cell for much of the previous four days. A guard tried to force the young man to his knees. But his legs, which had been pummeled by guards for several days, could no longer bend. An interrogator told Mr. Dilawar that he could see a doctor after they finished with him. When he was finally sent back to his cell, though, the guards were instructed only to chain the prisoner back to the ceiling. "Leave him up," one of the guards quoted Specialist Claus as saying. Several hours passed before an emergency room doctor finally saw Mr. Dilawar. By then he was dead, his body beginning to stiffen
Rigor Mortis
Rigor mortis is one of the recognizable signs of death.It may also refer to:*Rigor Mortis , a song by Cameo*Rigor Mortis , the thrash metal band*Rigor Mortis , the BBC Radio 4 comedy series...
. It would be many months before Army investigators learned that most of the interrogators had in fact believed Mr. Dilawar to be an innocent man who simply drove his taxi past the American base at the wrong time.
Death
The findings of Mr. Dilawar's autopsy were succinct.Leaked internal United States Army
United States Army
The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...
documentation, a death certificate dated 13. December 2002, ruled that his death was due to a direct result of assaults and attacks he sustained at the hands of interrogators of the 519th Military Intelligence Battalion
519th Military Intelligence Battalion
The 519th Military Intelligence Battalion is a unit of the United States Army.Personnel of the 519th MI Battalion were alleged to have killed the Afghan detainee Dilawar in custody at Bagram Theater Internment Facility in December 2002....
of the US army during his stay at Bagram
Bagram Air Base
Bagram Airfield, also referred to as Bagram Air Base, is a militarized airport and housing complex that is located next to the ancient city of Bagram, southeast of Charikar in Parwan province of Afghanistan. The base is run by a US Army division headed by a major general. A large part of the base,...
. The document was signed by Lt. Col. Elizabeth A. Rouse of the Air Force, a pathologist with the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology
Armed Forces Institute of Pathology
The Armed Forces Institute of Pathology was a US government institution concerned with diagnostic consultation, education, and research in the medical specialty of pathology. It was founded in 1862 as the Army Medical Museum and was located in Washington, DC on the grounds of the Walter Reed Army...
in Washington DC, and listed as its finding that the "mode of death" was "homicide," and not "natural," "accident" and "suicide" and that the cause of death was "blunt-force injuries to lower extremities complicating coronary artery disease".
A subsequent autopsy revealed that his legs had been "pulpified," and that even if Dilawar had survived, it would have been necessary to amputate his legs.
According to the death certificate
Death certificate
The phrase death certificate can describe either a document issued by a medical practitioner certifying the deceased state of a person or popularly to a document issued by a person such as a registrar of vital statistics that declares the date, location and cause of a person's death as later...
shown in the documentary Taxi to the Dark Side
Taxi to the Dark Side
Taxi to the Dark Side is a 2007 documentary film directed by American filmmaker Alex Gibney, and produced by Eva Orner and Susannah Shipman, which won the 2007 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature...
, the box marked Homicide
Homicide
Homicide refers to the act of a human killing another human. Murder, for example, is a type of homicide. It can also describe a person who has committed such an act, though this use is rare in modern English...
had been checked as the ultimate cause of death. however, the military
Military of the United States
The United States Armed Forces are the military forces of the United States. They consist of the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, and Coast Guard.The United States has a strong tradition of civilian control of the military...
had so far publicly claimed that Dilawar had died from natural causes
Death by natural causes
A death by natural causes, as recorded by coroners and on death certificates and associated documents, is one that is primarily attributed to natural agents: usually an illness or an internal malfunction of the body. For example, a person dying from complications from influenza or a heart attack ...
. It was only by accident that the death certificate was leaked, when New York Times reporter named Carlotta Gall managed to track down Dilawar's family in Yakubi, where Dilawar's brother, Shahpoor, showed her a folded paper, he had received with Dilawar's body. He could not read because it was in English. It was the death certificate.
Culpability
In August 2005, lead interrogator Specialist Glendale Wells of the US army pleaded guilty at a military court to pushing Dilawar against a wall and doing nothing to prevent other soldiers from abusingPrisoner abuse
Prisoner abuse is the mistreatment of persons while they are under arrest or incarcerated.Abuse falling into this category includes:* Physical abuse: Needless beating, hitting, or other corporal punishment....
him. Wells was subsequently sentenced to two months in a military prison
Military prison
A military prison is a prison operated by the military. Military prisons are used variously to house prisoners of war, enemy combatants, those whose freedom is deemed a national security risk by the military or national authorities, and members of the military found guilty of a serious crime...
. Two other soldiers convicted in connection with the case escaped custodial sentences. The sentences were criticized by Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Its headquarters are in New York City and it has offices in Berlin, Beirut, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo,...
.
In March 2006, the CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
News program, "60 Minutes
60 Minutes
60 Minutes is an American television news magazine, which has run on CBS since 1968. The program was created by producer Don Hewitt who set it apart by using a unique style of reporter-centered investigation....
" investigated the deaths of two Afghan prisoners, including Dilawar, revealing that authorization for the abuse came from the "very top of the United States government". "60 Minutes" correspondent Scott Pelley interviewed retired Army Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, who was appointed chief of staff by Secretary of State Colin Powell
Colin Powell
Colin Luther Powell is an American statesman and a retired four-star general in the United States Army. He was the 65th United States Secretary of State, serving under President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2005. He was the first African American to serve in that position. During his military...
in 2002, during George W. Bush
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
’s first administration. Willie V. Brand, one of the soldiers convicted of assault and maiming in the deaths of the two prisoners, and Brand’s commanding officer, Capt. Christopher Beiring, were also featured in the program. Wilkerson told “60 Minutes” the he could “smell” a cover-up and was asked by Powell to investigate how American soldiers had come to use torture and stated; "I was developing the picture as to how this all got started in the first place, and that alarmed me as much as the abuse itself because it looked like authorization for the abuse went to the very top of the United States government". Brand and Beiring confirmed that several of their leaders had witnessed and knew about the abuse and torture of the prisoners.
Beiring and Brand showed no remorse when recounting the torture. Beiring was charged with dereliction of duty, a charge that was later dropped. Brand was convicted at his court martial, but rather than the 16 years in prison he was facing from the charges brought against him, he was given nothing more than a reduction in his rank.
In August 2005, Sgt. Selena M. Salcedo
Selena M. Salcedo
Selena M. Salcedo was an United States Army soldier, who pled guilty to charges of dereliction of duty and assault in connection with the abuse of an Afghani prisoner, Dilawar, who later died....
, a female interrogator with the 519th Military Intelligence Battalion, admitted to mistreating Dilawar. In a military court Salcedo pleaded guilty to dereliction of duty and assault, admitting she kicked the prisoner, grabbed his head and forced him against a wall several times. Two related charges were dropped and she was reduced in rank to corporal or specialist, given a letter of reprimand and docked $250 a month in pay for four months. She could have gotten a year in prison, loss of a year’s pay, reduction in rank to private, and a bad-conduct discharge.
2007 inquiry in civil court
In July 2007, a grand juryGrand jury
A grand jury is a type of jury that determines whether a criminal indictment will issue. Currently, only the United States retains grand juries, although some other common law jurisdictions formerly employed them, and most other jurisdictions employ some other type of preliminary hearing...
opened a civil inquiry into the Bagram abuse.
Alicia A. Caldwell, writing in the Huffington Post, quoted a former military defense lawyer, named Michael Waddington
Michael Waddington
Michael Stewart Waddington is an American Criminal Defense lawyer specializing in serious felonies, court martial cases, and war crimes....
, who said:
Duane M. Grubb, Darin Broady, Christopher Greatorex and Christopher Beiring, four of the GIs in who served at the centre at the time of the deaths, acknowledge that they had been called before the Grand Jury.
They were reported to have waived immunity.
External links
- Amnesty International 16 July 2003 "Detainees undergoing interrogation by agents of the CIA in the Bagram Air Base have allegedly been subjected to "stress and duress" techniques, including prolonged standing or kneeling, hooding, blindfolding with spray-painted goggles, being kept in painful or awkward positions, sleep deprivation, and 24-hour lighting. Two detainees died at Bagram Air Base in December 2002 in circumstances suggesting that they may have been beaten. The military investigation into the deaths was still ongoing in late June, according to the Pentagon."
- Karzai Shock at US Afghan 'Abuse' BBC NewsBBC NewsBBC News is the department of the British Broadcasting Corporation responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs. The department is the world's largest broadcast news organisation and generates about 120 hours of radio and television output each day, as well as online...
, May 21, 2005. - Army Faltered in Investigating Detainee Abuse
- Editorial: Patterns of Abuse, New York Times, May 23, 2005.
- U.S. 'Thumbs Its Nose' at Rights, Amnesty Says by Alan Cowell, New York Times, May 26, 2005.
- Failures of Imagination, Columbia Journalism ReviewColumbia Journalism ReviewThe Columbia Journalism Review is an American magazine for professional journalists published bimonthly by the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism since 1961....
, 2005, issue 5 - US Soldier Jailed in Afghan Abuse BBC NewsBBC NewsBBC News is the department of the British Broadcasting Corporation responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs. The department is the world's largest broadcast news organisation and generates about 120 hours of radio and television output each day, as well as online...
, August 24, 2005. - Washington Post – Down a Dark Road by Richard Leiby on April 27, 2007