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Serious questions thus remain regarding the claimed guilt of these suspects, including the alleged mastermind, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed. He had:
-- no lawyer;
-- was isolated at black sites for over two years, including the secret "Dark Prison" near Kabul International Airport, infamous for its absolute lack of light combined with brutalizing torture;
-- another north of Kabul called the "Salt Pit," where in 2002, a detainee was stripped naked and left chained to the floor in freezing temperatures until he died;
-- while in Afghanistan, Mohammed was hog-tied, stripped naked, hooded, and abused repeatedly in numerous ways, including being:
-- kept in a prolonged state of sensory deprivation for months;
-- waterboarded numerous times;
-- chained naked to a metal ring in his cell in a painful crouch in intense heat and extreme cold;
-- bombarded with deafening sounds round the clock for weeks;
-- thrown against walls forcefully, a procedure called walling;
-- suspended from the ceiling by his arms so his toes barely touched the ground;
-- beaten with electric cables;
-- given electric shocks; and
-- forced to endure a variety of stress positions for extended periods, causing excruciating pain until;
-- in 2006, he was sent to Guantanamo where his torture continued, included being waterboarded over 180 times. The other four suspects received similar treatment.
An ICRC report said high-level Al Queda prisoners were repeatedly tortured, especially Mohammed for his alleged mastermind role. To exact a confession he was told: "We're not going to kill you. But we're going to take you to the brink of your death and back."
