Despite Pledge, U.S. Still Not Letting Gitmo Detainees Tell Their Stories

Despite promises to allow Guantánamo prisoners to speak more freely about their experiences there, the U.S. government is still blocking the release of over 100 pages of notes and diaries from torture victim Abu Zubaydah. The U.S. had for many years taken the position that the prisoners could not describe their own experiences of torture and confinement because those activities were classified. But in January, after the release of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s torture report, the government changed its classification rules. In a brief filed in a military commission case, the government wrote that “general allegations of torture” minus specific details about the CIA agents involved or the location, were now unclassified.