The American Civil Liberties Union's legal case on behalf of Khaled Al-Masri, a German citizen who was detained for five months in a CIA-run prison in Afghanistan in 2004, is currently pending an appeal in the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va.
The lawsuit was brought against the former CIA director George Tenet, other CIA officials and U.S.-based aviation corporations for violations of United States and international human rights laws.
"I want to know why this was done to me," Al-Masri said through his interpreter in Washington.
Al-Masri said it was important to him to get an explanation and an apology, so he can go back to his old way of living. "I simply want to feel secure again," Al-Masri said.
Al-Masri said he was on a holiday trip to Macedonia, when he was seized by the Macedonian police and held for weeks without being charged and without a possibility to communicate with his family or German authorities. He said he was detained in a hotel room for 23 days without permission to look outside the window and he was "kicked and humiliated" several times.
"I was mortally afraid for five months in Afghanistan. Conditions were not human," Al-Masri said, describing the facility in which he was imprisoned. "I went on hunger strike for 37 days," after which he said they force-fed him.
They used solitary confinement, sleep deprivation and food that one wouldn't feed to an animal, Al-Masri said, including "chicken bones and chicken skin cooked in water."
He described the drinking water as looking like it was from an aquarium that had not been cleaned for a year.
"One sip and you would taste it in your month for hours," Al-Masri said. When he complained about conditions to the Americans, they said, "that's not our problem, that's the problem of the Afghans."
Later, he was released in Albania, in the middle of the night.
"I don't know why they arrested me, I don't know why they've released me," he said.
The CIA knows everything about Al-Masri but they didn't accuse him of anything, he said.
Anastasiya Shaposhnik, a senior in the College of Arts and Sciences, was angered by the case, but not surprised.
"It is ridiculous that this should happen," she said. "Even if I were doing something wrong, it would be unacceptable to kidnapped in one country and taken to another."
She elaborated, however, that she has to come to expect the government to act secretly.
"That is the way government functions for perceived security purposes," Shaposhnik said.
Laura Krachman, a freshman in the School of International Affairs, said she also has heard of cases of government secrecary.
"I have heard of at least a few of these cases," she said. "Based on the premise of our judicial system of being innocent until proven guilty, they don't adhere to U.S. law and hurt innocent people."
"The term 'extraordinary rendition' is used by the CIA, when they capture a person in one country and send them to another country, to interrogate or charge for some terrorist offense," said Hunter Whitestone, criminal defense attorney at the Whitestone, Brent, Young and Merrill law firm in Virginia.
This couldn't be done in the United States, he said, only outside where there are different laws. Whitestone said he thinks the extraordinary rendition is not legal even under European Union law.
"The U.S. needs overwhelming evidence. You can arrest someone and have a trial, but just detaining someone definitely isn't okay," Krachman said.
On the other hand, Chris, a Master's student in SIS, doesn't perceive the detentions as unique to the United States. "In the interest of national security, the U.S. isn't acting exceptionally. Any other country would violate international law to preserve national security. They aren't just detaining for fun."
CIA's spokesperson declined to comment on Al-Masri's case. She said, the CIA never made any comments regarding Al-Masri' allegations. ACLU is a non-profit and nonpartisan organization of civil liberties activists.
