U.S: Gitmo detainee dies of apparent suicide

updated 9:51 p.m. ET June 2, 2009

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - A Yemeni detainee at Guantanamo Bay has died of an apparent suicide, U.S. military officials announced Tuesday.

The Joint Task Force that runs the U.S. prison in Cuba said guards found Muhammad Ahmad Abdallah Salih unresponsive and not breathing in his cell Monday night.

His is the fifth apparent suicide at the Guantanamo prison, which President Barack Obama plans to close by January.

In a statement issued from Miami, the U.S. military said the detainee was pronounced dead by a doctor after “extensive lifesaving measures had been exhausted.”

Held without charge since 2002
The Yemeni prisoner, also known as Mohammad Ahmed Abdullah Saleh Al-Hanashi, had been held without charge at Guantanamo since February 2002. Military records show the alleged Taliban fighter was about 31.

The apparent suicide occurred late Monday, but it was not revealed by the military until after a dozen journalists who were covering a military tribunal session left the base near midday Tuesday. A Defense Department official said the reason was that the Yemen government had not yet been notified.

Medical records previously released by the military in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by The Associated Press showed that the prisoner's weight had dropped to about 86 pounds (39 kilograms) in December 2005 — an indication that he may have joined a long-running hunger strike among prisoners. He weighed 124 pounds (56 kilograms) when he was first taken to Guantanamo in February 2002.

The military won't identify hunger strikers, citing privacy rules and a desire to keep detainees from trying to become martyrs.

Being held in psychiatric ward
Attorney David Remes identified the Yemeni as one of six inmates held in the prison's psychiatric ward along with his client, Adnan Latif. He said all the men in the ward had been force-fed a liquid nutrition mix through a tube inserted in their noses and down their throats.

"Salih was being force-fed in a restraint chair; the other six surviving inmates are being force-fed from bed," Remes said, adding that he didn't think the Yemeni had any legal representation until two lawyers arrived in February.

"They were due to see him for the first time in a couple of weeks," he said.

Remes said the death serves to refute a Pentagon report prepared for Obama saying Guantanamo's prison meets the standard for humane treatment laid out in the Geneva Conventions. The February report was written in response to Obama's order to close the prison within a year.

"Despite small improvements since President Obama took office, conditions there remain appalling," he said from Washington. "I hope this tragedy will prompt the president to take another look at the conditions at the prison, and focus his attention on the human consequences of his delay in closing (it)."

A prison spokesman, Navy Lt. Cmdr. Brook DeWalt, confirmed the incident but declined to discuss further details on how the Yemeni man apparently committed suicide and whether any family members have been contacted.

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