Ammar al-Baluchi

Ammar al-Baluchi was born on 29 August 1977, in Al Ahmadi, Kuwait. His family was of ethnic Baluch, originally from Balochistan, Pakistan. Baluchi grew up in Kuwait but spent most of his teenage years in Iranian Baluchistan. He is a citizen of Pakistan. Trained as a computer technician, he dressed in Western clothes and "introduced himself as a businessman", but had been "groomed ... since boyhood" by his cousins and uncles "to join their clandestine war," according to journalist Deborah Scroggins. According to a U.S. government biography, his "chief mentor" was his cousin and 1993 World Trade Center bombing orchestrator Ramzi Yousef, "who taught him in the early 1990s in Iran about the importance of war against the West." He is fluent in English and worked at Mohammed's honey-processing company in Karachi for a while before being hired in 1998 as a computer technician for Modern Electronics Corporation in Dubai. According to some evidence given at the Combatant Status Review Tribunal, he was "very open-minded and western-oriented", while his ex-wife told investigators he was "a very strict Muslim" who opposed his wife's leaving the home. ==Career==

Preparation for the 9/11 attacks According to a U.S. government biography, al-Baluchi "volunteered his services" to his uncle, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, in 1997. The 9/11 Commission reported that he "helped them with plane tickets, traveler's checks, and hotel reservations", and "taught them about everyday aspects of life in the West, such as purchasing clothes and ordering food". On 18 April, al-Baluchi sent a wire transfer of $5,000 to Adel Rafeea, the administrator of the Islamic Center of San Diego, from the Wall Street Exchange Centre in Dubai, using his PO Box, passport and listing his phone number as 0506745651. but this plan was set aside in order to focus on a plan to bomb the US Consulate and other Western targets in Karachi. • He also worked with his uncle to prepare Majid Khan and others for travel to the United States to conduct terrorist operations. The marriage was confirmed by Pakistani and US intelligence, a defense psychologist, and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's family, while Siddiqui's own family denies she was married to al-Baluchi. Siddiqui describes al-Baluchi as very kind to her, "a good man who is wrongly accused"; however, Siddiqui later repudiated all statements given by her to the FBI. The marriage lasted only a couple of months. According to one of KSM's uncles, Mohammed Hussein, al-Baluchi felt alienated by Aafia's "liberal way of life". Aafia told the FBI that al-Baluchi divorced her after he was arrested. ==Arrest by U.S. authorities in Pakistan==

Siddiqui was arrested 29 April 2003 in Karachi along with al-Attash. , 2004 While in CIA custody, al-Baluchi served as a "training prop" to teach torture techniques to trainee CIA interrogators. One torture technique, known as "walling", was often practiced on al-Baluchi. In it, trainees would line up and take turns "shoving" a naked and tied-up al-Baluchi head-first into a plywood wall behind him, with sessions typically lasting for a few hours each. One of the instructors identified the goal being to "bounce" al-Baluchi's head off the wall. Analysis carried out by a neuropsychologist in 2018 found "abnormalities indicating moderate to severe brain damage" consistent with traumatic brain injury in al-Baluchi's brain. In addition, the inspector general said that interrogators in the black site also carried out torture that went beyond the CIA's guidelines, including dousing him with ice water and forcing him to kneel backwards with a stick behind his knees in a stress position. In a senate report from 2014, officials noted: "al-Baluchi was tortured and forcibly dunked into a tub filled with ice water. CIA interrogators forcibly kept his head under water while he struggled to breathe and beat him repeatedly with a truncheon-like object hitting him and smashing his head against a wall." Discovery of other plots to attack civilian targets According to US investigators, al-Baluchi told them that al-Qaeda had set up a biological weapons lab and he asked Aafia Siddiqui (who has a biology degree from MIT) advice on how long it would take to develop such weapons and whether the man in charge was capable of developing the weapons. Siddiqui replied that she "was willing to participate in a biological weapons (BW) project if al-Qaida tasked her to do so". Another plot involving al-Baluchi alleged by US investigators involved Heathrow airport. According to al-Baluchi's file, he told interrogators that he became aware of a plan to attack Heathrow airport in January 2003 and had intended to seek help from a more senior al-Qaida operative, Walid bin Attash, to carry it out. An "analyst note" in the files notes that the plot called for "crashing numerous airplanes into Heathrow, with a secondary explosion immediately outside of the airport as a diversion". It collapsed after KSM was arrested in March 2003. == Transfer to the U.S. Guantánamo Bay prison in Cuba ==

DC.'' In December 2005, Human Rights Watch listed al-Baluchi as a "ghost detainee" held in the CIA prison system. al-Baluchi was kept in CIA custody until 6 September 2006, when he was transferred to Guantanamo Bay Prison in Cuba. Al-Baluchi's attorney James G. Connell III visited him there in August 2013 under an order issued by the military commission. , al-Baluchi was stuck in a state of legal limbo, yet to face trial. No journalist has been able to talk to him since his detention, due to strict restrictions imposed by the US government. Declassified CIA documents revealed that the CIA had been using al-Baluchi as a human experiment for interrogators learning torture techniques. He was subjected to water dousing, cramped confinement, sleep deprivation, put in stress positions and walling. Medical professionals examining al-Baluchi reported serious consequences like brain damage, traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress disorder as a result of torture. Combatant Status Review Tribunal (2007) US District Court Justice Joyce Hens Green ruled that the Combatant Status Review Tribunals were unconstitutional. Nevertheless, the Department of Defense scheduled Tribunals for the 14 high-value captives who were transferred from covert CIA custody, on 6 September 2006, for early winter of 2007. The Summary of Evidence memo for al-Baluchi's Combatant Status Review Tribunal was drafted on 8 February 2007. Al-Baluchi cooperated with his tribunal. Although he was not able to call Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Saifullah Paracha or Ramzi bin al-Shibh to testify about his lack of connection to al-Qaeda, he was permitted to have his legal representative field statements they had made. He chose to put forward the statements by Mohammed and bin al-Shibh as evidence, but not the statement by Paracha. Baluchi requested statements be garnered from Modern Electronics Corporation personnel, including Samir Sharin, Mohammed Mayer, Asraf Mayer, Ammar al-Tesqui and Sayed Tesqui that would testify he had no connections to militant forces, and that his employee records would show that he left several days before the attacks because his work permit had expired when MEC closed its Dubai branch. Although judges Peter Brownback and Keith J. Allred had ruled two months earlier that only "illegal enemy combatants" could face military commissions, the Department of Defense waived the qualifier and said that all fourteen men could now face charges before Guantanamo military commissions. First military commission (2008) In February 2008, al-Baluchi was committed to a joint trial, charged with conspiracy, attacking civilians and civilian objects, causing serious bodily injury, murder, destruction of property, hijacking, terrorism and providing material support for terrorism. al-Baluchi, Walid Bin Attash, and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed chose to serve as their own attorney. They requested laptops, and internet access, in order to prepare their defences. In October 2008, Ralph Kohlmann ruled that the men be provided with the computers, but not the internet access. al-Baluchi's request said he was a Microsoft Certified software engineer. On 8 December 2008, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed told the judge that he and the other four indictees wished to plead guilty; however, the plea would be delayed until after mental competency hearings for Hawsawi and bin al-Shibh. Mohammed said, "We want everyone to plead together." Executive Order 13492 of Barack Obama (2009) On 22 January 2009, United States President Barack Obama issued Executive Order 13492, ordering a halt to the Guantanamo military commission as part of the overall closure of Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp. On 21 April 2009, United States Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell cited "Ali Abd al-Azeez Ali" as an example of the kind of captive United States President Barack Obama might free in the United States when he closes the camp in January 2010, because he didn't know what else to do with him. Second military commission (2011) In October 2011, in an operation called the "baseline review," the prison seized all legal materials belonging to "high-value detainees," starting with Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri. The prison also announced that it would change its previous policy and begin reviewing legal mail for its content. In response, the Chief Defense Counsel (United States) ordered the attorneys under his supervision to stop sending privileged communications to Guantanamo prisoners. Under the Chief Defense Counsel (United States) policy, Al-Baluchi could not receive mail from his attorneys until November 2013. On 4 April 2012, the Department of Defense referred Guantanamo military commission charges against al-Baluchi and four other men for participation in the conspiracy leading up to the September 11 attacks. On 5 May 2012, Military Judge James Pohl arraigned al al-Baluchi, and appointed attorneys to represent him. Preliminary hearing on admissibility of clean team evidence (2019) During a preliminary hearing, held on 17 September 2019, the prosecution released a transcript from a conversation al-Baluchi had with another captive, when they were in two nearby recreation yards. ==In popular culture==

Zero Dark Thirty (2012) A fictionalized account of al-Baluchi's interrogation at black sites is depicted in the 2012 film Zero Dark Thirty. The character Ammar is portrayed by Reda Kateb. Al-Baluchi has complained that the United States has provided more information to the filmmakers Kathryn Bigelow and Mark Boal about al-Baluchi's treatment in CIA custody than it has to al-Baluchi's own attorneys. CIA acknowledgement The CIA acknowledged that the character Ammar is based on al-Baluchi. In the film, CIA interrogator Dan Fuller and other characters repeatedly describe Ammar as Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's nephew. Fuller also references the arrest of Ammar and describes his role as the financial facilitator in the 9/11 attacks. "The first 25 minutes of the movie are largely taken up with torture: Ammar is strung up, beaten, water boarded and kept awake for 96 hours straight." == Notes ==