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Oct. 4, 2021 - Jordan B. Peterson Podcast

02:41:41

Enhanced Interrogation Techniques | Mohamedou Ould Slahi | EP 195

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	If you had to be beaten or you had to listen to people being tortured, I know this is a terrible question, but it speaks to the intensity of listening to people being tortured.
	Which of those was more torturous?
	Listening, absolutely, no question asked.
	Why?
	Yes, because when they start beating me, Okay, a lot of anxiety and a lot of inside pain goes away.
	Because my body is weakened.
	And the problem is to have like strong body and destroyed soul.
	Because somehow the soul and body has to be balanced out.
	So if you like, if you threaten me, And then you put me in a situation, especially if you have power over me, put me in a situation that is so painful.
	And I'm eating myself from inside.
	But when you beat me, and then you cause me pain, and that pain, this is horrible to say, but it's good for me.
	Because it weakens the sharpness of my mind to process the perceived pain that I may be receiving.
	I'm speaking today with Muhammad Uld Salahi, born December 21st, born December 21st, 1970, who spent 14 years in Guantanamo Bay without being charged, arriving August 4th, 2002.
	released October 17, 2016.
	He wrote a memoir in 2015 while still imprisoned.
	The U.S. government declassified it in 2012 with numerous redactions.
	It was the first work by a still-imprisoned Guantanamo detainee, Published in 2015, became an international bestseller.
	It details Salahi's experience of being force-fed seawater, sexually molested, subjected to a mock execution, repeatedly beaten, kicked and smashed across the face.
	And all spiced with threats that his mother would be brought to Guantanamo and gang-raped.
	Prison officials prevented Salahi from receiving a copy of his published book.
	The Mauritanian, a film adaptation of the memoir, was released on February 12th this year, directed by Kevin MacDonald and starring Jodie Foster, Tahar Rahim, Benedict Cumberbatch, and Shailene Woodley.
	He's been living in Mauritania since his release.
	He reattained his passport last year and has been attempting to gain permission to travel.
	Not least to Germany to see his son.
	Thank you so much for inviting me today in your program.
	And I feel truly honored to talk to you and to your audience.
	My name is Mohamed Bursulahi.
	I come from Mauritania.
	I was born in the South.
	My father was a camel herder.
	I don't know any father of mine who wasn't a camel herder of sorts.
	And my dream was to grow, to be a camel herder, just like my father.
	But this dream was cut short because of the successive Drought that hit the country in the 70s and the 80s.
	So all our camels died out.
	So died, I mean.
	And we had only very few that couldn't sustain the life of a big family.
	So we are 12 siblings from the same father and the same mother.
	So my mother decided single-handedly to move the family against the will of my father near the city for the children to find jobs and just to make livelihood because my father was hanging on a dream that would never materialize.
	So he was living in this fantasy that he could recuperate but How many camels did your father have?
	And you were living in a rural area at that point, obviously.
	Yes.
	So I heard...
	So when I... The thing I remember, it's like a dozen, a little bit over a dozen.
	And then they became fewer and fewer.
	So when my father died, when I was 11, we had only like several, maybe three, four.
	And how did you survive?
	I mean, how is it possible for a family of that size to survive with that limited supply of livestock?
	What else was the family doing in order to keep everything together?
	So my father, my mother decided that the kids need to abandon this lifestyle and find jobs in the cities.
	So my oldest brother went to Senegal across the border.
	We were just at the border, southern border to Senegal and I was seven at that time.
	This was 78.
	And then the other kids found a job at bakeries and just to make ends meet.
	So we have the same plate.
	So we all contribute.
	They couldn't find a job for me because I was very weak and very small.
	And then the second best thing they sent me to school.
	And it was by accident, and I didn't have a birth certificate.
	So we went to the school, the principal said, he doesn't have birth certificate, but I accept him.
	And I want you to give me birth certificate.
	That's why you see my birth certificate has different birth dates, sometimes no birth date, sometimes 31st, sometimes 21st, sometimes 11th.
	Anyway, and then I fell in love with school because I just loved it.
	And I remember this very hot day.
	Very hot.
	When we say hot in Mauritania, it's really hot.
	And the school was, I just went the other day and I measured the distance.
	It was about two kilometers.
	That is over one mile.
	And I used to walk this distance back and forth twice a day because we have the morning class from 8 to 12 and the afternoon class from 3 to 5.
	So meaning I walk every day at least 8 kilometers, about 6 miles every day.
	And I didn't have shoes.
	And I remember running and then my feet burned like beyond the description.
	Then I would go to structures and the few trees to cool them down.
	And then on my way, our neighbor, which was doing well, she stopped me and started scolding me, telling me, why didn't you wear your shoes?
	And then started telling me this is really bad and you should always wear your shoes.
	And I was burning.
	She was talking to me and I was burning.
	And I was too ashamed, Jordan, to tell her that I didn't have money to buy shoes.
	My family was so poor.
	We just came from the countryside and she just kept scolding me.
	So I agreed to go back to My home and then pretend that I wear shoes, but instead I took another route where I avoided this woman.
	That's how we did.
	It's like I rarely ate meat because I didn't have money.
	But I did well in school, even though my family never asked me how I did.
	They didn't even understand the concept of passing from one class to the next.
	Were you the only sibling who went to school?
	Yes, me and the older one.
	And what kind of education did your parents have?
	Aside from Bedouin education, none.
	So Bedouin education where you learn how to read, to write.
	Or like homeschooling, which is automatic.
	When I went to school, I knew how to read and write because that's because we were like a book tribe, you know, a tribe that, you know, because you have in Mauritania, like the tribes that carry weapons and the tribe that carry the books.
	So we carried the books.
	And what's the distinction between those two?
	What's the distinction between those tribes?
	Obviously books and weapons, but I've never heard that distinction drawn before.
	So what does that mean exactly?
	So it means it's like kind of a caste system that disappeared, but I saw it in my lifetime.
	So some tribes They carry weapons and build this emirate.
	They collect taxes, and they provide security, and they protect the borders.
	And some tribes, they don't carry weapons, they just carry the books, and then they take this religious leadership where they organize religious ceremonies like marriage, Divorce, like jurisprudence, like kind of an unofficial judiciary.
	I see, and so there's no separation between those functions in some sense and having the books.
	And what books?
	What are the characteristic books?
	Yes, so what we learn is mostly like grammar, Arabic grammar, and Greek philosophy and religion, Quran, and the tradition, what we call Hadith.
	And that's it.
	That's the extent of it.
	No languages, etc., etc.
	And what's the Greek philosophy?
	You said that was taught at home.
	Yes, all of it.
	So what did you learn about Greek philosophy?
	It seems like a rather strange intermingling.
	So how does that come about, the mixture of Greek philosophy and education according to the Quran, let's say?
	Well, Jordan...
	So I didn't advance in this homeschooling to get to Greek philosophy because you have to be old enough.
	So the Islamic jurisprudence is based on what they call...
	Usul.
	And usul is derived from Greek philosophy.
	So the whole jurisprudence is derived from the logic of the Greeks.
	And we have already this discussion that in order to modernize our jurisprudence, Islamic jurisprudence, we have to learn Leibniz and we have to learn about Einstein, we have to learn Descartes, because the Greek philosophy on which this whole Islamic jurisprudence is built It's outdated, obviously.
	Okay, so back to your schooling.
	So you came into the city, you couldn't find a job specifically, so you were sent off to school.
	And what kind of school was that?
	What did you learn there?
	And was it like a standard Western classroom?
	How was it organized and what did you learn?
	So it was a French school system that the government inherited from the French colonial time and it was just different than the school system I'm used to at home because at home I can learn at my own pace And there are no tests, you know, you just learn what you want.
	And then for as long as you want, which was much more advanced and much more better for me.
	But the school system, it was so much, the French school system, so much pressure.
	So I had like very strict curriculum and I have to go with it, even though if it's like quicker, I have to keep pace.
	If it's too slow, I have to wait.
	I cannot learn with my own pace.
	I did well, actually.
	I was always number one until I graduated.
	Never was I number two.
	I used what I learned at home.
	It was a big advantage for me.
	And so, as soon as I finished high school, I received a scholarship from Germany.
	This is like wild.
	I'm a Bedouin.
	Right.
	Did you even know what it meant at that point to receive a scholarship from Germany?
	No.
	It was all by accident, pure accident, because I really wanted to go to France because I love France because there is so much advertisement.
	And I watch French TV. I like French music.
	what's her name?
	I forgot her name, you know.
	Mon Ami LaRose.
	It's a very old song.
	Yes.
	Yes, Edith Piaf.
	Yeah, I love it.
	It's a great movie made of Edith Piaf's life.
	It's a brilliant movie, yes.
	Yeah, so I want France.
	This is all advertisement, you know, and the magazines, so I want to go to France, but...
	Did you enjoy the French school?
	Did you enjoy the French school system, or was it hard on you?
	You did well, so what was it like as an experience?
	I enjoyed it a lot.
	But, you know, I enjoyed, I went to two schools at the same time.
	So I went to the traditional Quran school, And the French school.
	I went to the Koran school because I loved the friendship in the mosque, you know, like what you would call in Canada, Sunday school.
	I don't know whether you have it, but Americans always talk about it.
	So I love this Sunday school because I have so much freedom.
	So I can do whatever I want and there is no pressure whatsoever.
	And ironically, the thing I learned in the In the Sunday school, I mean, in the mosque, I retain them to this day because I chose to learn them.
	And in the French school, yes, there was some kind of pressure, especially during the test.
	I don't like tests.
	I think tests are the worst thing that the Western civilization has come up with.
	I don't think tests are horrible.
	Why should I test anyone?
	If you don't want to learn something, just don't learn it.
	And if I was responsible for the system in my country, I would do away my first day with tests.
	No tests.
	You just learn as you want.
	And if you are a doctor, you just go to the hospital and work in the hospital.
	Your senior doctors would know whether you are qualified or not.
	A computer engineer, you just go find someone to show them what you learn, and then they will give you a job, and they will see whether you can do the job.
	Because test is not indicative of anything.
	Well, you had intrinsic motivation, obviously, and you loved to learn.
	So it was probably superfluous for you to have the pressure added.
	So you got a scholarship to Germany.
	What happened as a consequence?
	So it was 1988.
	I was only 70.
	And it was the first time any member of my family ever traveled abroad.
	Aside from Senegal.
	Senegal is just very close.
	It was the first time any member of my family ever boarded a plane.
	It was, you know, it was amazing.
	And I remember when the plane took off, I was frantically reading Quran because I memorized the Quran to this day.
	I know every single page.
	And this student who already went to France said, are you scared?
	I didn't know my answer, what was my answer, but actually I was scared.
	But I'm sure I told him I wasn't scared.
	Well, it's not surprising.
	I mean, first of all, you were on a plane for the first time and you're not familiar with them.
	And then you're going to a completely foreign country and no one in your family has ever done that.
	And tell me about the tribe.
	You said you were from, again, from the tribe that was focused on books.
	What's the tribal organization?
	It's beyond the family, obviously.
	What does it look like?
	So a tribe is kind of a small country.
	Like the tribe, a tribe is a family name.
	So you have your tribe, that's your family.
	So if you are sick, they will provide you.
	If you get in trouble with another tribe, they will go to the tribe and they will make peace.
	If there is money that needs to pay, they would pay the money.
	Let's say if you kill someone, you know, by mistake, so your tribe will pay for the other family who lost that person, you know, As like a kind of insurance.
	And I always say in Mauritania, we should adopt this tribal system, but the country should be one single tribe, just like in Canada.
	Canada is a big tribe because the Canadian state is the one that provides you with health insurance.
	They have set up insurance, damage insurance, To pay, and if you kill someone by mistake, your insurance pays, i.e.
	your tribe.
	And I think that's the best way I could describe what a tribe...
	I think it's...
	How many people would compose the tribe that you belong to?
	How large was it about?
	I don't have any scientific number, but I would say when I was growing up, I would randomly say 100,000.
	And how many tribes are there in Mauritania?
	Do you know?
	A lot, a lot of tribes in all shape and form.
	Not only the warrior tribe, you have the warrior tribe, you have the book tribe, i.e.
	Zawaya, and you have the almost serving tribes, like the tribe who provide services, like Artists, this is like almost an independent tribe, and all they do is just like entertainment.
	And you have, unfortunately, I have to admit, we had slaves They just like serve, you know, you own them and they serve you.
	In, I think, 81, this was abolished, you know, but we need to face up to this horrific past and just...
	Well, we all have a lot of horrific past to face up to.
	Yes, unfortunately.
	Yes, unfortunately.
	Well, hopefully we can do better.
	That's the plan, right?
	So, all right.
	So you got on the plane and you read the Quran on the plane and you made it to Germany.
	You must have.
	It's no wonder you were afraid.
	I mean, what did you think was waiting for you there?
	So I had no clue.
	You know, I like surprises because when I was sitting like with one of the people in the studio and then someone asked me, so what are you going to talk to Jordan about?
	I said, I have no clue.
	And then he said, and I said, I don't care, whatever.
	And I like surprises and I'm very curious, you know, just like you.
	And so we arrived in Paris because I had to change the, there was no direct flight to Frankfurt.
	So I changed the, the first thing I saw in Paris and I'm ashamed to say this everything was clean and everybody was wearing very tight clothes and everything was in place and the women were wearing very nice clothes everything was and of course that was the impression later on I I noticed that
	the clothes are really not very comfortable, you know, for some reason, because the boo-boo and the African loose clothes were worn for a reason.
	And so I took my plane.
	I had...
	I had...
	I had 80...
	I had in my pocket about...
	Twelve dollars, twelve or thirteen dollars.
	That's the money that my family gave to me as a pocket money.
	Twelve or thirteen.
	And eighteen francs.
	Eighty francs.
	And so I took my plane and we arrived like 11 p.m.
	in Frankfurt.
	I did not speak English.
	I did not speak German.
	So I came there and then they stamped my passport.
	And then for some reason with just everything, they showed me the hotel where I spent the night.
	And then it was Sheraton.
	For the first time, Jordan, I sat in a room alone and that was very scary because my family was big, my family was very loud, and every time, at every moment, someone is watching you.
	Right, so you were alone for the first time in a foreign country where you didn't speak the language.
	Yes, and alone physically, with no one.
	Yes, right, right, I understand.
	And that was very scary to me.
	And because...
	In a very weird way, my privacy was defined by the people around me because they were my cocoon.
	You know, because I trust them.
	I'm not afraid of them.
	I could do everything in front of them.
	But now I'm alone.
	It was like the people I'm used to were filled with ghosts.
	But I'm afraid of ghosts.
	And then I took a shower and I did like just everyone.
	I love the towels.
	I love the small teeny tiny soup.
	I stole everything.
	I put it in my bag.
	That was my first theft.
	And so I fell asleep watching German TV. I didn't understand anything.
	And then a friend of mine who came with me, whose family is a little bit richer, and they used to go to Paris, not him.
	He came knocked at my door and said, Mohammed, do you know?
	We can eat for free.
	This is a hotel.
	I said, really?
	I said, yes.
	He took me.
	To the elevator.
	Last night I took elevator but I was so tired I didn't pay attention to this like miracle.
	You know something that small room that you get into and then it stops.
	It's very disorientating because I didn't know how many stairs I made up and down and then went to this buffet very huge With a lot of people.
	White people, European people, by and large.
	And I'm a small Bedouin.
	And then there was everything.
	Eggs, all types of bread, marmalade, all kinds of teas.
	But this was the proverbial German, the torture of too many choices.
	I only use to, in Mauritania, tea and bread.
	And when we were like, doing really good, they give me butter in my bread and marmalade, really good stuff.
	So this all was new.
	And I was telling myself, I need to eat something because I would look foolish and I would look strange if I don't eat something.
	Then I choose eggs because I know how to eat eggs.
	Or at least I thought And then I sat there.
	I felt like everyone was looking at me.
	Everyone put everything down and I was the scene.
	And then I broke the eggs.
	It was not cooked very well.
	And I hate half-cooked eggs.
	We say in Mauritania, we say in Mauritania, I found myself with thorny twigs between my legs.
	So I couldn't move forward and neither could I move backward.
	And so I thought, I need to get out of this place.
	And then I hid the egg somewhere and I drink that.
	It was horrible.
	It was Lipton.
	I hate Lipton, you know.
	You know, I love my tea being very well cooked and very well brewed, you know, because this is tasteless to me.
	Like, you know, a bag, you put it in hot water, there is no...
	No taste to it.
	So all that food, you got half-cooked eggs and bad tea.
	Talking about bad luck.
	And then we took the plane to the city of Zarebrücken at the border of Senegal, very close to Strasbourg.
	And so we took a small plane, and because the small plane was really very wobbly, I thought, God want to punish me.
	Now this plane is going to crash because I stole the soap from the hotel.
	And then I was really, so I was like praying frantically and I promised myself, I took it upon myself never to steal anything anymore.
	You know, if I survive this very bumpy ride.
	And we arrived at Tsarbrücken, I started the language, I studied, and I graduated in telecommunication microelectronics a few years later.
	How many years did you study there?
	I stayed in Germany 12 years.
	I studied and I worked.
	And you picked up German and English there or just German when you were there?
	Just German.
	I picked English mostly in prison.
	So, okay, what happened in Germany?
	What happened in Germany?
	You studied, you got your degree.
	Was it a technical...
	What educational institute was it that you attended?
	I attended...
	I will say the name.
	It's very long, very boring.
	Gerhard Mercator, University of Duisburg.
	Now it's called University of Duisburg Essen.
	And I studied microelectronics telecommunication.
	That is a very fancy way to say that you can program and you can like set up computer networks.
	And how did you choose that?
	How did you choose your course of study?
	Peer pressure.
	I wanted to be a pilot, but I had problems during my first year.
	And my friends told me that this is useless because in Mauritania back then we had a fleet of two airplanes.
	In whole Mauritania, two airplanes.
	And this is only like rich kids.
	They could go and make this pilot license.
	And I wouldn't have a job.
	They said the future is like microelectronics and so on.
	And I just wanted to study that because my friends told me that.
	And how did you make friends there?
	And how long did it take you?
	And what was your family?
	How were you communicating with your family?
	Yeah, we didn't have WhatsApp.
	I can't tell you that much.
	And like, we only had this phone.
	But we didn't have a phone at home.
	So I had to call my brother at work and tell him that I'm doing well.
	And then he relayed the message to the family because we didn't have a phone at home.
	That was in the early 90s.
	And were you lonesome?
	Were you excited?
	Like, how was your life when you got to Germany?
	You know, I was, you know, most of the time I was very depressed because of the cold.
	Because of the cold?
	Because of the cold, you know.
	And, you know, I went through a lot of depression because of, you know, my...
	You know, Germany is a lot of very...
	They have very, very distinct look to them.
	And I look different.
	And that did not help me a lot.
	German people are very nice people.
	But whenever I went to places and so, especially when I travel back and forth, They always put me on special screening, and I hated myself.
	You know, I was very young, and I always looked in the mirror and said, you know, I'm really a very bad person, because why did they pick me from all those people, you know?
	And so what did you make of that?
	What was your explanation for that?
	I mean, you said you thought you were a bad person.
	But did you experience...
	You said that the Germans were nice people, but you talked about the screening.
	So did you experience other forms of treatment that made you feel that way?
	Or was it primarily the airport screening?
	Not only.
	Also, when you look for a job, you know, during the...
	The, like, vacation.
	They always prefer, like, native German.
	Which, I mean, I kind of understand.
	But this all, like, I'm not giving any value judgment to any of this, Jordan.
	I'm just telling you how I felt.
	I felt I have, I had very low self-esteem.
	And then I started to completely neglect myself, neglect what I wear, which made the things worse.
	Was it because you were alone?
	I mean, you know, you said you hadn't been alone, and now all of a sudden you were basically on your own in this strange country.
	I mean, how much of being detached from your family and your tribe, for that matter, do you think contributed to your depression?
	And the darkness, perhaps, and the cold, all of these things.
	Yes, a lot.
	Your family is the one that gives you your self-esteem.
	My mother is the one who tells me, You have value.
	You are a good person.
	You are a very important person.
	And that's, I have always to be reminded of who I am.
	And in Germany, I tend to forget, you know, who I am.
	And I tend to forget those people value me.
	My mother values me no matter what.
	And it's like every time is a wake-up call, okay, I'm a very important person to my family, you know, to my surrounding.
	And I always remember this eerie music at the airport.
	Martha, Otto, Heinrich, Emil, Martha, Emil, Dora, Otto, Ulrich, Ludwig, Dora, Siegfried, Ludwig, Anton, Heinrich, Ida.
	He sees the German code to spell my name over the phone, so to see whether I'm a wanted person.
	And this is very hurtful to me, you know.
	And my life would not get any better.
	And I tell you why, because we need to mention the elephant in the room here.
	Why did the United States Arrest me, kidnapping.
	Why were they interested in me?
	Yes, well, we definitely want to get to that.
	Yes, so if you want, I can go ahead and tell you.
	Well, so we've got, you're in Germany, you've been there a number of years, so sure, let's progress with the story.
	That story was, I would say, three minutes phone call that completely changed my life.
	I would never be talking to you if it hadn't been for that phone call.
	I wasn't doing very well, so I'm not saying, oh, I was doing very well and then this phone call.
	I was struggling in my marriage.
	You know, and I was looking for jobs because, you know, like I told you, I wasn't German, and so it was very hard.
	And my papers were not, I didn't have like the green card, but I was still waiting to get my green card.
	And I just got it, actually, when I had this phone call.
	I just, my life started to get really good.
	And the phone rang.
	I was living in Friedrich Ebertstraße.
	I remember.
	And I pick it up.
	It was my brother, my ex-brother-in-law.
	And he asked me, he said, my father is very sick and I need your help.
	I said, of course.
	He said, I have some money, but I cannot transfer it.
	But I can send it to you to Germany because and then you can send it to my father.
	I said, no problem.
	I think it was about $5,000, if I remember correctly.
	A lot of money.
	And that's it.
	That was the phone call.
	He sent me the money, and I took it physically, and I gave it to some of the people who come back and forth, do commerce in Germany.
	But there was a problem with this phone call.
	This phone call was conducted from a mobile satellite phone that belonged to the late Osama Bin Laden.
	And my brother-in-law was a close friend to Osama Bin Laden.
	So the American You know, put one and one together, and they assumed that I was up to no good, because Osama Bin Laden back then already declared war against the United States, against innocent people of the United States.
	I was not aware of any of this.
	No, I was aware of the problem.
	And when they investigated, when I was taken into custody, But no, no.
	I'm forwarding really too fast.
	So they...
	So the money was sent to you and you distributed to some people to get it to your friend's father.
	That's what happened.
	Correct.
	That's it.
	So the money trail was very clear where the money landed.
	Because I was not the only person he contacted that day.
	He did two phone calls I know of.
	He contacted me and he contacted the person who would receive the money.
	Do you think he had any sense that he was putting you in danger?
	To be perfectly honest, it's very hard to read what was in his mind, but he put me He completely changed my life in a very negative way.
	Right.
	Well, you did say that his father was ill.
	And so, obviously, he was, at least in principle, motivated to help his father.
	So perhaps that was obscuring his vision.
	I mean, did he know that...
	Do you think he knew that there was a possibility that using telecommunication equipment that was associated with bin Laden might not be such a good thing for you?
	I mean, maybe he didn't.
	I'm just curious what you think.
	He took very...
	He did not consult me.
	So he made this decision for me, that's for sure.
	And I don't think that he thought that the phone was even tapped.
	Right.
	But he did it now that some people who were sitting with Osama Bin Laden day in day out were working with the CIA. Very close.
	Very close friends, Osama Laden, were transmitting information to the CIA, you know, and he was very blinded, I guess.
	And I have to mention, he was investigated and he is now Freeman and they did not find any connection with him and any, like, Wrongdoing.
	I see, I see.
	He was just associate of Osama Bin Laden.
	They were like friends, but he did not engage with him in any of, in any, in any attacks or anything.
	So I just need to mention that.
	Okay.
	Now you also mentioned that you were married.
	So you got married in Germany?
	Yes.
	My wife, my ex-wife is a Palestinian German.
	And, you know, at that time, And I wasn't doing well in my marriage, so I have to say that.
	And I don't know whether you ever found yourself in a relationship where you don't want to get out of it because you don't want to bear the shame of being the person who is responsible for breaking up the relationship.
	But You didn't want the relationship somehow.
	I was in that very bad situation.
	Right.
	So you had a couple of things that weren't going so well.
	So you were depressed about your situation in Germany and your marriage wasn't going well.
	And then this phone call came and you transmitted the money.
	What happened after that?
	Everything went downhill.
	So this was like late 98, early 99.
	So the police, I was not arrested.
	I was never interrogated.
	I was never held.
	I was never invited by the police.
	Never.
	So German found no ground to arrest me or to even question.
	But they went to our Imam, that is like the priest, the equivalent of a priest in church.
	And they found, so they made an appointment with the Imam, and they told him, this one of the people who come to your mosque is being investigated.
	And then he was laughing.
	And when they showed him the picture, he told me later on, he said, this guy wouldn't hurt a fly.
	I know him very well.
	They said, that's maybe, we may even agree with you, but a very powerful country is interested in him.
	And this was like almost a tip off, that I should be careful not to travel.
	But I freaked out.
	And then I had a friend...
	You heard this from the Imam?
	He told you this had happened?
	Yes.
	And so what did you think when he told you that?
	Actually, I wasn't surprised because my family already called me.
	Because when I was called, he also called my other cousin who would receive the money.
	My cousin was arrested immediately and put in prison for two months.
	So my family knew that he was being wanted.
	He was wanted.
	And they told me never to receive any phone calls from him.
	And not to accept his phone call and not to accept to interact with him.
	So I wasn't surprised, actually.
	Right, you knew something was up and not something good.
	Yes, yes.
	And who got arrested?
	Was it the person you delivered the money to or the person who sent the money?
	No, the person whom I delivered the money to.
	The other person was never arrested, ever.
	And was the person who received the money arrested in Germany?
	No, no, no, no.
	Germany is a country ruled by law.
	They don't arrest you.
	He was arrested in Mauritania because, at least back then, he didn't respect the proper legal procedure.
	And because the U.S. government sent two notices, one to Mauritania and one to Germany.
	Germany says, we cannot arrest him without evidence.
	Mauritania said, we arrest him.
	That's the difference.
	So you received the money in Germany.
	Did you give the money to this person in Germany and then he went back to Mauritania?
	No, I sent it to him.
	So I sent it to him to what they call loosely Hawale.
	So you give to a person in Germany and the person call his family or his associates to give the money in Mauritania because I see, okay.
	They changed money, currencies.
	So you used a service that moved money?
	Yes, absolutely.
	So I freaked out.
	And I said, I need to leave Germany.
	I cannot live in a place where people think I'm a bad person.
	And then...
	My friend lived in Montreal.
	Mohsin, his name is Mohsin.
	He's five years my senior.
	He finished his study at the same university.
	We became very good friends and he moved to Canada and he was working and living in Canada.
	He became Canadian citizen when I arrived.
	He told me, Canada is a very good country, what you study is very wanted, and you can apply.
	And I applied, I had this as a plan B, and I was accepted right away, you know, because they need a lot of IT people and so on and so forth.
	And then I said, I'm moving to Canada, joining my friends.
	And in November, Of 99, I purchased one-way ticket and I moved to Canada.
	As luck had it, in December, 15th of December, a person by the name of Ahmed Rassam tried to cross the Canadian-US border with explosives and harm innocent people.
	So Americans said, okay, what's going on?
	So this guy had a phone call from Osama Bin Laden's phone, and he came to Canada one month later, a guy who attended this mosque.
	In a one-way ticket?
	Yeah, one-way ticket.
	And they made this very wild theory based on circumstances that was very wild and very harming to me.
	And they called me the mastermind of a millennium plot.
	And, of course, they told Canadians.
	Canadians were very worried, obviously.
	But Canadians could not arrest me because there was no evidence, obviously, because I don't know the guy.
	I never heard of him.
	I never met him.
	And let alone, like, conspiring with him to harm innocent people in the U.S. So did they assume that you were associated with this person who had been bringing explosives in?
	That I was the mastermind.
	I see.
	You planned that and this was your next step, was it?
	Correct.
	Yes, correct.
	And so Canadians did not arrest me, but they were very aggressive.
	They put a listening device in the apartment where I lived.
	And they spied on my conversation.
	I would know that later on in Guantanamo Bay because I was faced with my phone calls in Montreal.
	Confronted, I mean.
	And so, American, like I said, This guy is very smart.
	He does not leave any trail.
	This guy, he speaks like German, Arabic, French, and he's an engineer, and he's not going to leave a trail.
	So we need to lure him to a place where there is no law, because we cannot arrest him in Canada, we cannot arrest him in the US, we cannot arrest him in Canada, in Germany, because We don't have the evidence.
	He needs to provide the evidence himself.
	So they assumed you were an engineer, that you were multilingual, that you had purchased a one-way ticket to Canada, that you were associated with Bin Laden, that you were tangled up with this previous terrorist.
	That was all part of it.
	And that you were smart enough to cover your tracks.
	Yes.
	And I needed to be arrested and to be roughed up, quote unquote, in order to tell them everything.
	And people were freaking out.
	And, you know, I'm very sympathetic to law enforcement, you know, especially in democracies who try to protect people.
	And I could see the logic behind everything.
	What I couldn't see It's like treating someone outside the rule of law because Canada is advanced, Canada is safe because of the rule of law.
	In the Middle East, countries are either failing or failed countries because of the lack of the rule of law.
	Because ironically, those gloves The gloves of the law are the ones that keep countries safe and prosperous.
	So, Canadian intelligence, American intelligence, and Mauritian intelligence agreed to an operation that would have me lured outside of Canada and kidnapped.
	So, the Mauritian intelligence approached my mother and they said, Mohamedou is in a lot of trouble in Canada.
	And you need to call him back home and so we could clear his name and he could go back to Canada and work just like anyone.
	And who made that claim?
	Sorry, who contacted your mother?
	The Mauritanian intelligence.
	The Mauritanian intelligence, okay.
	Correct.
	Or the lack thereof.
	And so my mother, you know, she was a Bedouin and her understanding that the state You know, we should abide the state, you know, especially in the military.
	Like, I grew up in a military dictatorship, and we were very scared, very afraid.
	And whatever happens, she did not understand Canada is a country ruled by law, and I shouldn't be afraid to be in Canada.
	So she said, whatever happens to me, it's better to happen in Mauritania than to happen in Canada, because all countries are the same.
	And so she called me, said, I'm sick, you need to get home.
	I purchased my ticket the next day, and I left Canada on January 20th of 2000.
	I arrived in Dakar, Senegal, where my family waited on me on January 21st, 2000.
	From the airport, I was kidnapped and interrogated in Senegal.
	And who picked you up?
	Who kidnapped you?
	And why do you use that phrase specifically?
	I don't know.
	I guess...
	Okay, okay, okay.
	I guess why did I use it?
	So, I think it would end up in a kidnapping because of what I'm going to tell you.
	So, Senegalese told me, we arrest you.
	Uh...
	We arrest you in the name of law.
	We arrest you in the name of the law.
	That was very okay with me.
	Very good.
	They took me to prison and they interrogated me.
	And then they said, there is no evidence against you.
	They told me.
	So you're free to go.
	Americans said he cannot go.
	They put me in a plane against my will.
	The American, they chartered the place.
	So you got freed from the Senegalese prison?
	Yes.
	And were you reunited with your family?
	What happened?
	What was exactly the sequence of events?
	So Senegalese told me, Mohammed, we're free to go.
	We have nothing against you.
	So Americans in the embassy, they ask them not to release me because they want me.
	So they sent a car You know, SUV from the embassy.
	And the embassy took my custody.
	And what did they tell you when they picked you up?
	No talking.
	Nothing.
	I was just put in chains.
	They took me.
	They chartered the plane.
	They sent me to Mauritania.
	So what did you think was going on?
	I was thinking they want to torture me.
	Because they didn't want me to go back to Canada because they went so far.
	I went so far I couldn't go back because Canada was like a protection for me.
	A protection for quote-unquote bad guy.
	This is a bad guy and he need to crack.
	He need to tell us what he did.
	Did you know it was Americans that had picked you up when you got into the SUV? Yes, yes, yes.
	I know because Senegalese told me Americans are the one who sent the report, are the one who asked them to arrest me.
	We need to understand that Senegal is a democracy and it's ruled by law.
	But it's not strong enough to oppose the encroachment of American embassy.
	They are not as strong as Canadian institution because in Canada, the U.S. embassy cannot take people because that would be in breach of grave A breach of Canadian laws.
	So many people would get in trouble.
	But anyway, so they put me in that plane, very small, and it was so small that I could see the pilot.
	The pilot was a female, a French female pilot, and she was just like a taxi driver with a small plane, and she just chartered her small plane to move people who are from one place to the other.
	And I prayed and I almost was fantasizing that the plane crashed and that I survived the crash because I don't like pain and I read so much about torture and I don't like torture.
	So I was delivered to the Mauritanian.
	Did you have any sense at that point of why you were in trouble?
	I didn't know.
	I didn't know but I kind of I kind of know because Canadian came to my home And they told me, they interrogated me about Ahmed Rassa.
	But they didn't...
	I see, I see.
	Right, right.
	And you knew also that there had been some trouble around the money transfer.
	And did you know at that point of this association with Obama bin Laden?
	No, no, nothing.
	Nothing yet.
	No mentioning even of the name of my former brother-in-law.
	And so...
	I... So...
	So I just was...
	I cannot describe to you the pain of the prospect of being tortured.
	I cannot describe it.
	What were you imagining?
	What did you think was going to happen?
	I was very serene.
	And...
	I was thinking, like, existential-like question.
	Because, like...
	One of my bodyguards seems to be a very religious person, because he kept praying in the plane.
	And I was asking myself, what is the role of religion?
	How much can a religious person do?
	And where does a religious person say, I'm not doing this, I'm stopping?
	And this was too much to think about, because...
	A guard cannot, has to trust somehow the state because he doesn't know who I am.
	You know, as far as they're concerned, like his boss told him, this is a vicious person.
	He was planning to kill random people, children, women, old people, young people randomly at an airport in the U.S. So, and And I was seeing my city,
	the city of Newarkshot, and I could see the pallet after a storm, a sandstorm, you know, the colors and people very tiny walking and the favelas, you know, where I grew up, I could see everything.
	And the helplessness, you know, of me not being able to be happy.
	Because in like five minutes, I would walk out of the plane, greeting my family, drinking tea, telling them stories.
	I knew I was going to a prison cell.
	I was almost certain I would be tortured.
	I was thinking, what does it feel like to be tortured?
	I don't know.
	But I read books, and I was thinking about the brave people who survived torture.
	And I knew, Jordan, I was not a brave person.
	Because I want to crack at the very first moment, you know?
	I did not want to resist.
	Because the pain, you know, I love this saying, Jordan, the most powerful weapon of your oppressor is in your mind.
	You're right.
	Well, that's why I was asking you what you were imagining, you know, because that can be terrible.
	I was absolutely defeated.
	And the pain I felt in my stomach, in my abdomen, and I felt like in my mouth, very like Very bitter taste in my mouth.
	And, you know, the helplessness.
	You know, I mean, Jordan, you have to appreciate where you live.
	You have to appreciate that you grew up in a democracy and you take it for granted that not No one can take you without giving you a reason why they take you to the police.
	And you have a big mouth.
	You can say, no, I need a lawyer.
	I don't need to talk to you.
	And you can, like, start and develop your narrative with your lawyer, everything, you know, to save yourself.
	None of that.
	So in a country that is not ruled by law, you have none of these rights.
	You know, so they took me in Renault 12 from airport.
	Very old.
	And, you know, Mauritania, we are like Bedouin, and they want to put a mask over my face, though I couldn't see.
	They didn't have a mask prepared.
	And then one of them gave me his turban that he used on his head.
	He said, you need to wrap this turban around your head.
	Very tightly.
	And I could smell his sweat.
	You know?
	And so they took me to a secret prison.
	And they start interrogating.
	And so, and like, my past started to come out.
	So in my past, in 91, between 92, I spent a couple of months On two different occasions in Afghanistan.
	They came to our mosque and they wanted to gather money and so it was a very big Like, think in Germany.
	And this was a campaign that was supported by Germany, supported by the U.S., by my government, by Canada, by the U.S., to help the Mujahideen, the so-called Mujahideen.
	And I was very young.
	I said, oh, I need to be part of this.
	And I went there, and I didn't like it, and then I left.
	But this was nonetheless something I told them.
	I'm sorry I went there, and so...
	And so after one month of interrogation, Mauritanian, they did not torture me.
	They did not torture me.
	And did anything else come to light during that interrogation that cast you in a bad light, that was hard on your reputation?
	No, nothing.
	Nothing, because it turns out Mouritanian knew that I went to Afghanistan because it's in my passport, because there is a stamp in my passport.
	So they knew that.
	And what only came to light was that I don't know.
	They told me, like, Americans wouldn't provide them any evidence.
	And they were stuck because Mauritania told Americans to take me.
	But Americans refused.
	And Mauritania, like, were Actually breaking the law by offering me because you cannot turn off a Mauritian citizen once they hit the Mauritian ground.
	So you have to try them if they did any crimes, no matter what.
	So why do you think you weren't tortured?
	Was it a standard practice there or not?
	And if so, why did you escape torture?
	Okay.
	You see, like, Intelligence, like in authoritarian regime, they don't just jump on you and torture you.
	They have to have good reasons.
	So we have to be very objective when we describe things.
	So they told me, if I don't cooperate with them, they will torture me.
	If there is evidence, they have to know I'm hiding something.
	But Americans wouldn't provide them any evidence that I'm hiding anything that I didn't tell them.
	And I adamantly told them that I had no clue about Miller and Platt.
	I don't know Ahmed Rassam.
	I never met him.
	And Americans wouldn't give them any evidence to the contrary.
	So they were somewhat inclined to believe you.
	They did believe me.
	They did believe me and they told Americans, either you give us the evidence or we're going to release him.
	And then Americans asked them a favor.
	They said, okay, take away his passport and don't let him go back to Canada.
	Monetary intelligence, as usual, ever breaking the law, they took my passport and they did not allow.
	And Canadians also Asked them not to allow me to travel back to Canada because Canadians found them in a very hot spot.
	Because Canada is very close to the US and they just don't want any trouble with their big brother, which is understandable.
	And I said to myself, okay, they took my passport.
	I applied for a job and I found a very good job as a programmer and administrator.
	And I started writing code.
	And until 9-11 happened, I was arrested, kidnapped.
	And that's it.
	And tortured.
	All right, so you're in Mauritania.
	They let you out.
	You've been imprisoned there, but you have a story and the Mauritanians accept the story.
	What happens after that?
	So they told me I cannot travel because the United States did not want me to travel.
	And I said, okay, I just find a job in Mauritania.
	You know, my dream, my dreams of studying for my PhD in Canada were dashed.
	I said, It's okay.
	You know, I need to work anyway.
	And then I found a job in Mauritania and I started feeding my family for like over a year until 9-11 happened.
	And everything changed.
	So you're in Mauritania, 9-11 happens, but you're working and you're taking care of your family in Mauritania.
	And so 9-11 happens, and what happens to you?
	What's the consequence of that?
	On 29th of September, that is about a little bit over two weeks after 9-11, I received a phone call again from the police, Uritainian police.
	And they said, we need to talk to you.
	I said, okay.
	The guy said, where are you?
	I said, where are you?
	I'm coming to you.
	And they said, okay, I'm at this and that place.
	And then I drove my car and met him.
	And he was very frank.
	He told me, American told us to arrest him.
	I said, why don't you tell them that I didn't do anything?
	He said, they're very angry because of 9-11 and just bear with me.
	They just will ask you some questions, they will let you go.
	And then they came, and they brought a German translator, and then they interrogated me.
	I don't know who interrogated me.
	So, a guy, maybe CIA, maybe FBI, maybe, I don't know.
	And where did that take place?
	In Mauritanian prison.
	Okay.
	And they left.
	And then again, Mauritaine released me.
	And then after one month, they took me again.
	And then they told me that American wants me in Jordan.
	And I lost it.
	I lost it.
	I said, this is too much.
	Because I guess Americans figured out this is his home.
	This is his tribe.
	And this is a corrupt regime.
	Maybe they're protecting him.
	We need to take him outside of his comfort zone where he has no tribes and we torture him.
	And then he will tell us everything.
	And that's exactly what happened.
	So they took me So they took me to the airport.
	Now, was that Mauritanians or Americans that took you to the airport?
	Mauritanian.
	Okay.
	So you're taken to the airport?
	Yes.
	And they put me in a plane with five people.
	Two sex people.
	Two pilots.
	Because they...
	Two pilots.
	And two interrogators.
	And two...
	People with masks.
	I couldn't.
	They didn't talk.
	They just with masks.
	Like a kind of commandos, special team.
	And so when they took me...
	So what were you thinking on this plane?
	What should I think?
	Just so much pain.
	I just died a thousand times.
	You know, I know I was going to torture.
	I know 100% I was going to torture.
	And the ride was about 12 hours.
	And one of the stations, one of the airports was in Cyprus.
	Cyprus is part of the European Union and the signatory of Conversion Against Torset, just like Mauritania.
	And I was hoping that they would board the plane And inspect the people, passports and everything.
	Because for an African guy to get a visa to Europe, it's almost like next to impossible.
	But now I'm going through Europe without even a passport.
	And I want to be arrested as a criminal and put in prison.
	You know?
	And this never happened because everybody was on it.
	And I say, Jordan, this is one of the biggest of the biggest betrayal of U.S. citizens.
	United States stood with Europe against the National Socialism and Europe, after 9-11, enabled the United States to gravely violate human rights instead of standing up to the government and said, no, American people deserve better.
	And America is better than doing this.
	America is ruled by the law.
	America should lead the world in human rights.
	It should not violate human rights because this would open...
	A can of worms and would give like a carte blanche to all those horrific regimes to do whatever they wanted.
	And I landed in Jordan.
	And then I was put in this secret prison.
	And most of the time I didn't know day from night.
	You know, I was beaten only two times during eight months.
	And, but the thing that hurt me so much when they took me to listen to torture sessions, you know, they blindfolded me, they put me in a room and they start torturing this person, you know, for me to break.
	And I couldn't get...
	Do you think that the...
	Was that taped, do you think, or was it something that was happening right there?
	Do you think?
	Jordan, I didn't know.
	I mean, this is a very smart question.
	Yes, okay, that's fine.
	Smart question, but...
	I mean, it doesn't matter really from your perspective when you're there, but I'm curious, I suppose, about the methods.
	Yes, yes.
	I mean, it's horrific.
	The problem with that, I couldn't get the cries of my head.
	So they put me back in my cell.
	I couldn't sleep.
	I couldn't see it for days and then I would like plug my ears and then I hear even louder when I plug my ears.
	You know, the more I plug my ears the more I hear it because it's in the brain and the brain does not need your eyes or your ears to see or hear.
	How often were you exposed to that sort of thing?
	I remember like Maybe a dozen.
	But I was only moved twice.
	So I have a question for you.
	If you had to be beaten or you had to listen to people being tortured, I know this is a terrible question, but it speaks to the intensity of listening to people being tortured.
	Which of those was more torturous?
	Listening.
	Absolutely.
	No question asked.
	Why?
	Yes.
	Because...
	When they start beating me, okay, a lot of anxiety and a lot of inside pain goes away because my body is weakened.
	And the problem is to have like strong body and destroyed soul because somehow the soul and body has to be balanced out.
	So if you like, if you threaten me, And then you put me in a situation, especially if you have power over me, put me in a situation that is so painful, and I'm eating myself from inside.
	But when you beat me, and then you cause me pain, and that pain, this is horrible to say, but it's good for me.
	Because it weakens the sharpness of my mind to To process the perceived pain that I may be receiving.
	It's like when you have depression and when you walk or when you work out.
	Work out is just torturing yourself.
	And then it goes, dissipates somehow.
	So how long were you in prison in Jordan?
	Very good question.
	So I tried to keep a calendar in my head.
	So I say one, two, three.
	I wasn't bad.
	So when they told me you are going out, they gave me a paper to sign.
	I was expecting July 31st, 2002.
	I saw in the paper July 20 or 21st.
	I don't remember.
	I was completely off, you know, because nights and days somehow, somehow mixed with each other.
	I don't know why.
	Well, you said you weren't sleeping well, and that's not surprising.
	So that could easily, I mean, and I presume how much time did you spend outside?
	Maybe 20 minutes or 25 minutes outside.
	Per day or in total?
	No, in total.
	Oh, so never, really?
	Yes.
	And what did your family...
	That took me one time outside, and I was so scared because, you know, you are so vulnerable when you are exposed to torture because you feel like, I want my torture.
	I want to be close to my torture.
	I want my torture to be...
	To be satisfied.
	I want them to put me in this cell because that's what satisfies them.
	I don't want to be in a big space.
	It's very weird to explain.
	Because I saw this torturer has a God-like power.
	They give you food.
	They talk to you.
	They said, if you are a good guy, I'm going to treat you well.
	If you are a bad guy, I'm going to punish you.
	This is immediate, immediate power.
	And yes, so I want to tell you this epiphany a little bit because Because it's very important to understand this kind of forgiveness that I really have in my heart.
	So they came to me.
	I was very weak.
	After eight months of battering, eight months of mind destruction, mind and body, I was very weak.
	I was about...
	Less than 100 pounds.
	And I'm 171 or 172 centimeter.
	And less than 100 pounds is really very skinny.
	So they gave me this guy, threw a garbage bag in my cell, said, you're going home.
	Then I took the bag.
	I had very small belongings, like this big, like underwear.
	And I think I had a t-shirt.
	That's it.
	And then he told me to turn around.
	Ironically, that's a sign of respect to give your backside to the guard because he wants to control you and put your hands behind your back and shackle him.
	And then he led me, always blindfolded.
	I was never led to see anything, except when they pushed me inside the cell.
	And then they removed the...
	And then I sat in a chair like this, facing a guy, middle-aged guy.
	He looks, he spoke almost like a religious figure.
	And...
	It was like everybody around him was like out of focus because like a movie, you know, people who cannot see them very well.
	My eyes were glued on him.
	And he was telling me, okay, this is your belonging.
	Okay.
	And I was supposed to say that he was right.
	I got everything back.
	I think I had $80.
	Something like that, or $100, I don't know.
	And then had my Canadian driver license, German driver license, passport.
	And he said, is this everything?
	Of course I said yes.
	What did he expect me to say?
	And so this summary judgment that would show that the prison staff was good was done very quickly.
	And what I want at that moment, I want to pee.
	But I couldn't tell him I want to pee because I want to go home.
	And then they put me in this hearse, like blindfold, earmuffs, everything.
	Then they drove me to the airport.
	I could hear the roars of the engines because I was on the runway.
	And all of a sudden, someone started to, like, cut open my clothes.
	With very sharp scissors.
	And then they stripped me completely naked and they put a diaper on, diapers on.
	I figured I'm not going home.
	And I'm not going to another prison in Jordan.
	I'm going to the US. And this was Like confirmed when this guy briefly remove the blindfold and open my eyes and I could see his blonde hair on his arm.
	He did not say anything and he had like very black bag on his face, mask on his face.
	Well, could only see the eyes.
	And blue eyes, I presume.
	I don't know if this is fake memory, but I figured he is not a Jordanian.
	And I just imagined that this was the end of my life.
	Did you think at any time then that you, like, had your hopes been raised that you were maybe going home?
	No, after this, I knew I was not going home.
	No, before, I meant on the way, before you hit the airport, did you think that maybe you were going to be free?
	I was crying all the time.
	And I was saying, this is the first time in my life I would enjoy a bathroom in an airplane.
	I hate bathrooms in airplanes.
	And this is so good.
	And I would meet my family.
	This is so like imagination.
	And then I was like, but I was kind of like destroyed mentally because I was thinking, How could I live?
	Because I was in prison with good relationship with God and I was like pure in my soul and then now I'm going back to life and you know in life you have to fight with people you know and then to do you have to do the wrongs because like occupational hazard of living your life.
	And then it hit me after that, after they start to put me in new clothes and diapers that I would have a very long ride and it's going to the U.S. And I figured I would die forgotten in a very violent American prison.
	What do you think the purpose of the diapers was?
	The purpose of the diapers?
	Because very long flights.
	And you cannot, security, they will not take you to any place.
	You have to pee in your diaper.
	I see.
	I see.
	Okay.
	So this is very important, at least to my mind, because this moment changed my life forever.
	My life before this CIA team that took me from Jordan and after the CIA took me from Jordan are two different episodes that Have very little to do with each other.
	And I tell you why.
	So, when I came to the conclusion that I will die, this is it.
	This is my life.
	I started to reflect on my past.
	And then I start to regret.
	And there is only one thing I regretted in my life.
	One single thing I regretted.
	I regretted not to be nice enough to people.
	I regretted when I told my mom I didn't like this food, this food is not as I expected.
	I regretted when I got sometimes angry and I expressed my anger in a less than nice way.
	I did not regret not having money.
	I did not regret not having this beautiful woman I always dreamed about.
	I did not regret not being in a position of power in my life.
	All the things that demand so much effort and work had no value to me.
	And the things that are so easy to do in life are the ones that matter to me.
	Being nice.
	And I took it upon myself.
	If Allah God allows me to live again.
	I promise to be a nice person to everyone I need, no matter what.
	You know?
	And that's what the change in my life.
	Why do you think that transformation occurred then?
	What's your understanding of why that occurred?
	This is like the first time that I really Thought that I will never see life again, that I will die in an American prison.
	Then I had to face my past because that's, you know, facing death.
	It's strange the way that facing death would make you reevaluate your life like that.
	Because in some sense, you think it's a bit late, isn't it?
	I mean, if you think you're going to die, but then all those thoughts come to mind that you could have been a better person.
	Yes!
	I know, I know, but...
	It's like your soul is being weighed, you know, in light of your impending death, and you're evaluating your whole life.
	Yes, absolutely.
	And I mean...
	I mean, this is like, you know, in a very weird way, I think I'm lucky because I had the unique, you know, experience, maybe not unique, but very few people at this experience, you had it, that they faced death.
	And they said, what should I change in my life?
	What should I change in my life?
	And I knew what I need to change.
	You know, I know I don't need a lot of money.
	Of course, I love to have money.
	Of course.
	But I wouldn't like break my back or break my head to make money.
	Absolutely not.
	But I make so much effort, painful effort to be a nice person.
	And it's not easy to be a nice person.
	And what do you mean by being a nice person?
	What does that entail as far as you're concerned?
	Absolutely.
	So when I'm upset with you or with my family, I have to control what I say.
	I have to control what I do because I always want to leave a good taste, no matter what.
	Also, when someone asks me for help, I have to provide them help without hurting myself.
	The only way I deny help if this help, very help, is going to hurt me.
	And that's not a problem to me to deny, to not accept to help.
	And that's it.
	Just being nice to people, making a difference.
	Smiling, you know, to people.
	You know, making them feel good.
	This is very important to me.
	You said that when you were in Germany that you had bouts of depression that were long-lasting.
	What about now?
	It's very, I'm very depressed.
	Like, I have this PTSD-like episodes that will send me to the hospital for many days.
	And I almost died.
	One of the reasons for this very bad episode was taking clonopine, what they call, at least in the U.S., clonopine.
	And this was started in prison because I was really, I was very much a vegetable when it comes.
	Then they prescribed me clonopine and then they cut it cold turkey.
	Yes, I have some experience with that.
	Yes, I read.
	It's terrible.
	It's terrible.
	Oh my God.
	You cannot explain to someone who never went through that.
	No, you can't.
	It was absolutely unbearable.
	Oh my God.
	Oh my God.
	When I think about it.
	How long did that last?
	I don't know because I didn't have feeling for time.
	But the pain, I keep hitting my head against the wall.
	And I was crying like a child.
	I was crying like a child.
	And this was definitely a malpractice, you know, in prison, you know, because I read later on that it could kill you, you know.
	It makes you wish you were dead, that's for sure.
	Oh my God, it's horrific, you know, like depression.
	Depression, you cannot describe depression to someone who didn't go through it because I always told people, are you just a crying baby?
	What hurt?
	So do you have like injury, physical, bodily injury?
	No.
	So why are you like acting up very much?
	You know, why are you tripping?
	You know, but this is when I have this episode I cannot eat.
	I cannot drink.
	I cannot sleep.
	I'm so scared.
	I have always to have someone beside me, you know, watching over me, you know, and I'm much better now.
	I'm much better now, but I acknowledge that I'm very vulnerable.
	I'm Very weak.
	There are heavy stuff that I need to deal with, you know, with professional help and so on and so forth.
	So I'm not going to put a brave face and try to sell you something that is not there.
	Yeah.
	All right, so let's go back to the plane.
	So you're on the plane to the United States.
	And you think you're done.
	Yes, I thought it was to the United States.
	And then I almost died because I couldn't pee in the diaper.
	I kept squeezing, but my head refused to pee.
	You know, and after what I thought five hours, the plane started to lose weight.
	Altitude.
	I was telling, no, this is not the US. The US is not five hours.
	And then it landed.
	And then they took me out because I felt the wind.
	And then they put me in a chopper because very loud, I could hear through the...
	And then they put me in a truck and then I start hearing language I never heard before.
	It's not English, it's not German, it's not Arabic.
	Turns out it's some tribal Afghani language that I never heard.
	And so I landed, turns out, in Bagram Air Base.
	And then they took me to this prison and I spent...
	They started torturing that prison and So, but it's not, like, very heavy.
	They just, like, keep me, like, on my knees for very long hours.
	You know, I couldn't see.
	And then, very much.
	And then they put, like, strobe light over my head for hours.
	And they, first night, they came to me.
	Took me.
	No, peeing first.
	So when they put me, they stripped me naked and they put me in some clothes and I sat, they sat me.
	And I peed, peed, peed, peed, like there is no tomorrow.
	Then I felt so good, I didn't care what they did to me.
	Because now I peed, because now I felt I'm a free person, I'm surviving, you know.
	And So they took me, they asked me what languages.
	They brought an Arabic translator.
	They asked me what languages I spoke.
	Then I said German, among others.
	They said, German, you're a liar.
	Because who speaks German in this world?
	No one.
	And then they brought a special agent, CIA agent, who spoke German.
	Write them.
	And then he spoke to me in German.
	And he looked at them and said, this guy speaks German better than I. And then he looked at me and he said, Wahrheit macht frei.
	Truth will set you free.
	Truth will set you free.
	Because I, what came in my mind is this sign, Arbeit macht Frankreich.
	Yes, that's what came to my mind too.
	Yes.
	Yes.
	And it came to me that those people, Arbeit did not set them free.
	Work did not set them free.
	No.
	I know I was in big, big trouble.
	And then he interrogated me.
	He was not bad.
	You know, he was like, he was like, explained to me a lot of American culture and so, and he told me very much that I was screwed.
	Because in America, he told me, accusation is enough.
	In this situation.
	Yes, that's enough.
	That's enough.
	You will not be free.
	For a very long time.
	And you may be, he said, you may be guilty or not.
	I don't know.
	I don't have the information, but I can assure you that you would be treated as a guilty person.
	And he was very frank with me.
	Well, the assumption would have to be on the part of the people that had now arrested you and that were bringing you back to the United States.
	They're all going to assume that you're guilty, obviously.
	Correct.
	Absolutely.
	Absolutely.
	And this is the greatness of democracy, of the rule of law, that the state violence is kept in check.
	Is the state violence anywhere in the world?
	It doesn't matter your culture.
	It doesn't matter whether you're Christian, you're Jewish, you're Muslim, you're agnostic, you're Buddhist.
	Human beings always commit And the state has so much tools of oppression that the state cannot be, must not be, just left without checks.
	I mean, it's okay to say Jordan is a bad person.
	That's okay to say, especially by the state.
	But the state cannot harm you or put you in prison if they don't have evidence that can be checked.
	By a third independent party that does not subscribe to the bureaucracy of the state.
	And, you know, this is like everywhere.
	And this obsession, you know, 9-11 was a very horrific act.
	And let's say that full stop.
	So in the United States, there was a very big debate, you know, whether democracy and the rule of law can protect The United States of America.
	And a lot of people in the CIA, in FBI, and what's not, believe that the rule of law is not enough.
	They have to go outside the rule of law in order to protect the United States.
	And they have this obsession with dictatorial regimes from the Middle East.
	I know this because they told me.
	You know, they don't need gloves.
	They go down and dirty.
	And I was like, oh my God.
	I grew up in a military dictatorship.
	And people are not safe in a military dictatorship.
	Well, democracy might not make people safe, but there isn't an alternative that makes them more safe.
	Absolutely.
	Absolutely.
	And democracy is millions of times safer than dictatorships.
	You know, because in a dictatorship there is no Way around corruption.
	There is no way around corruption, you know, in the dictatorships, you know.
	And the corruption would hit also the security apparatus, you know.
	And I know this because I could see the contrast where I grew up during military rule and Germany.
	Germany, you can walk anytime you want.
	No one is going to hurt you.
	No one is.
	And in Germany, you know, no one can arrest you without due process, you know.
	And this whole, like, obsession that, you know, we need to treat people outside the rule of law, that's how we protect.
	I say this is wrong.
	And this is just an opinion.
	This is not a scientific...
	I don't have a scientific, but I would say it's wrong.
	And the empirical evidence is in the...
	What we see, Western democracies are much safer than any other country in the Middle East.
	So back to the helicopter.
	I was taken out of the aircraft and put in a chopper.
	And I have to mention that the CIA did not torture me during the trip from Jordan.
	No, this guy was very gentle.
	He didn't hurt me.
	And that wouldn't be the role in the future, because in Guantanamo Bay and in Bagram, every move, the guards who moved me, they roughed me up and they used the move from one place to the next to inflict pain on me, like pinching me or dragging me.
	Or run away.
	And they know I cannot run because I have shackles on my feet.
	But this all happened, I think, on the instructions of my interrogators.
	So anyway, so they took me.
	And I peed for the first time on my knees.
	And that felt really, really good.
	I didn't care about anything else.
	And I was stripped naked again.
	And then they took a hair, you know, from my hair, you know, and they interrogated me.
	The first interrogation didn't seem, they didn't seem to be very well informed about who I was.
	They just had the script It was like, where is Osama Bin Laden?
	Where is Mullah Omar?
	Mullah Omar is the former president of the Taliban.
	And they didn't know that I was in a prison.
	I wasn't out there.
	I wasn't picked up from a battlefield.
	So I had no clue.
	And where did that interrogation take place?
	Right when I was taken out of the chopper.
	And...
	So interrogation was done.
	They took me, put me in an isolation cell.
	And this woman came to me.
	She said, if you want to go to the bathroom, I remember this.
	You can ask this person.
	Because there was no bathroom in my cell.
	And, you know, like, I didn't speak English.
	And bathroom sounded like body cement.
	Like...
	Just literal translation, but in German means something else.
	It means a place where you take a bath.
	And I was thinking, oh my God, those people are so nice.
	I really want to take a bath.
	I said, I want to go to the bathroom.
	And they took me to a barrel full of human feces.
	And just...
	You know, put in a place and then they say, this is the bathroom.
	Because they didn't have like, they didn't have like bathrooms, like they have just like barrels and then detainees would do in the barrels.
	And it's very tricky because it's hanging, it's like, it's like very high, high up.
	And And then that was my first English, you know, real English word.
	So that bathroom is not a place to take a bath.
	And I was taken to Guantanamo Bay.
	And it was very torturous.
	I mean, they, you know, again, so we were put in the same shackle.
	We were about 34, I think, detainees.
	And there was a shackle that, you know, connected all of us.
	And they start processing us, blindfold, all kinds of shackles, and put us in the plane.
	And I couldn't breathe because I have claustrophobia.
	I almost died, you know?
	And this guy came to me and he told me, forget about it.
	I never forget this.
	And it was like, okay, either I survive or I die.
	So I'm not going to get any relief.
	Because I wanted him to remove the mask on my face because I couldn't breathe because of the mask.
	You know, just like this corona mask, you know, but I couldn't breathe with it, you know.
	I think mostly because of my claustrophobia.
	And we arrived in Guantanamo Bay after I think more than 30 hours.
	And it was like, oh my God, I was so happy that I arrived somewhere because so much pain.
	You know, everywhere.
	And they put me, like, they pushed me, you know, in what seemed like open space.
	And then I felt the sun.
	And then, you know, I was like, you know, this is, you know, this is much better.
	In my mind, now I'm under the full authority of the United States.
	So you were 30 hours in transport before then?
	You thought it was about that?
	I think it was more.
	What kind of transport was it?
	You said you were on a plane?
	Yes.
	The plane changed places, I think.
	Change place and stop somewhere, you know.
	Stop somewhere once or twice.
	Right, so it wasn't a direct flight?
	No, no, no, it wasn't.
	And so I arrived.
	So we started off in the morning of 4th of August 2002, and we arrived the next day, 4th of August, 5th of August.
	And they processed us.
	And I remember this gentleman coming to me and he spoke in Russian to me.
	And I didn't speak any Russian.
	And then, you know, we were all naked because they stripped us in the room.
	And you cannot get those images out of your head, you know.
	You are naked watching naked people around you.
	And this guy looked at me.
	I was smiling all the time.
	And this guy looked at me and said, where did they capture you?
	I remember this question.
	And I didn't understand it.
	I kept saying, what?
	He kept saying, where did they capture you?
	And then he was very frustrated with me.
	And then he said, never mind.
	Something like, never mind.
	And then I said home, something like that.
	And because I was captured home, and the last thing I saw when the police came to me was the Image of my mother as we drove away with the police.
	I saw her in the rearview mirror because I was driving my car and a policeman sat beside me.
	And she was getting smaller, smaller, smaller until I turned right and then she disappeared.
	At that point, I did not think that I would never see my mother again.
	But I never saw my mother again.
	I was never allowed to attend her funeral.
	I was never allowed to say goodbye to my mother.
	And so we arrived, and my first interrogation, they put me in a room.
	And, you know, I was like being kind of demanding, because I thought, oh, this is a cell.
	And I said, but this cell is small, but it was really big, big room.
	You know, human beings are very, you know, they always like Compare.
	And I thought this is like very small room.
	Then I tried to stand up and discover my surrounding.
	There was no one.
	And then I was dragged really forcefully down.
	And then I saw there is a bolt holding me to the ground.
	I was not aware of.
	And then I realized I'm not free in this room.
	I cannot move around.
	Then these two gentlemen, Three gentlemen came in the room.
	One is Bill.
	He said his name is Bill, and he's from the FBI. He was about my age, you know, 30, about early 31.
	And another person by the name of Paul.
	His name is Paul.
	I know his name.
	And then another person...
	I'm amazed you can remember these details.
	And then a translator from Morocco because I didn't speak English.
	And then they came to my room and then they started asking me questions.
	And Paul had an empty water bottle and he kept spitting in it.
	And I was saying, what does he spit?
	And then it was like very disgusting and black.
	And then later on, I learned this is normal in the U.S. I was looking at the U.S. as very sophisticated people.
	So he was chewing tobacco?
	Yes, he was chewing tobacco.
	They were spitting in front of everybody.
	And everybody could see the disgusting spits, very thick, very black.
	And I know I'm not sophisticated.
	I know my people are not sophisticated.
	I know that because that's where I grew up.
	But my image of Americans because of the movies, very sophisticated, you know, very clean, very organized.
	That was my first glimpse.
	I know they are just like other human beings.
	I was just waiting on the other FBI guy to pick his nose, because that's the next level, you know.
	Spitting in a bottle, you need to pick your nose to complete the picture.
	And they didn't do anything.
	They asked me whether I was mistreated in Jordan.
	I said, I don't want to answer that question.
	And that was for A couple of reasons.
	I didn't want to tell them that it's possible to torture me.
	I didn't want them to know it's normal.
	And the second thing, I didn't want them to trick me into giving them details.
	I just want to keep it very Very brief with them.
	So no information about that torture.
	They said it's not necessary.
	But they told me in the United States we don't torture people.
	And I was very happy.
	Because that's what I thought too.
	Because I watched Married with Children, a comedy.
	It was very funny.
	And I watched Law and Order back home.
	So this is America.
	Funny.
	And the rule of law.
	And so they kept this interrogation like almost on a daily basis, but I wasn't confessing to any amazing stuff.
	They were not discovering anything, and that was very frustrating for them.
	So the commander of the base and other people demanded that I need to I need to be put in a program to encourage me to cooperate with them.
	I was blissfully unaware, but in Washington they were devising a program of torture, so-called enhanced interrogation technique that was devised just for me.
	I don't know everything that's in there, but I think it's a document that is accessible.
	You know, but what I received was sexual assault.
	I mean, full physical contact.
	It's not like dirty talking or that.
	That happened too, but I mean direct, you know, like sexual assault, rape.
	And that was really bad.
	And then the first 70 days when they took me, I remember the first day.
	So the FBI came to me on 22nd of May, 2002.
	And the FBI guy, no 2003, sorry, my bad.
	And the FBI guy, his name was, his name was, was Rob Seidler, Robert Seidler.
	He gave me a book.
	It's called America and its People.
	It's about the history of America, you know.
	You know, it's...
	You know, and I love history.
	And it helps me also...
	Had you learned to speak English by that point?
	Yes, a little bit, with very heavy accent, but I understood almost everything I read because of my French vocabulary.
	And...
	And I like to read a lot, especially in prison.
	Whenever they give me something, I keep reading it.
	So I read this American people many times.
	It's very academic.
	And he told me, this is the last day his boss told him that I was not giving him the information, and he told me that my life was going to change, and that he wants me to cooperate with the next thing.
	And so, later on, I think one month, so they tried to, another team tried to intimidate me, everything, like military and other undefined agencies.
	But I told them, no, I'm not talking to you anyway, so.
	You can do whatever you want, kind of.
	It was very defiant, kind of.
	Very stupid for me.
	Well, what would have been your alternative?
	What else could have you done, do you think?
	Was there anything else other than...
	I mean, if you had nothing to confess, it's not that straightforward to cooperate, obviously.
	Yes, it's impossible.
	Damn you do it, damn you don't.
	Because, look, I thought about this a lot.
	Because if you confess without torture, that's a very heavy burden.
	I had to wait on torture because that's the only way you could This is hindsight.
	You could explain, I didn't do this.
	This is torture, you know.
	And so I was very scared, but I kept saying, you need to tell me what I did, and then I can cooperate with you.
	As long as you don't tell me, I'm not going to cooperate.
	And I was very, like, measured and logical.
	And defiant, and even smart, kind of smart with them.
	Like, I can tell you, for instance, they tell me, ask me, like FBI ask me a question.
	Even before the program.
	Okay, they ask me the same question next day.
	And I say, you asked me yesterday and I answer.
	Then they would say, but we want to make sure we're not lying.
	And I would say, I remember all the lies I said since I left home.
	I was comfortable enough to let out my frustration with them.
	You know, this is going to change dramatically.
	So, They came to me, the guards.
	And then they came in front of my cell on Mike Black.
	And they said, reservation.
	That's the code word that you are going to be taken away.
	And I said, where?
	Because usually they tell you interrogation or medical or something.
	So why are they taking me?
	They told me, it's none of your business.
	And I knew I was in trouble.
	And then so they had these rubber gloves.
	And then when they start putting me in shackle, I read on the rubber glove, India Block.
	And then I told the detainees, my co-detainees, I'm going to be taken to India.
	India Block is torture block.
	So we know that because there was only, the block was designed for 30 detainees.
	But there was only one detainee.
	They take only one or two detainees for torture.
	So when they took me there, I found one detainee, and soon that detainee was taken away.
	So I was by myself.
	The first 70 days in that blood, no sleep.
	And you would ask, how couldn't you sleep?
	Sleep is just sleep, you know?
	So the way they did it, interrogation 24.
	So they have like three shifts.
	So one interrogator, then the next interrogator, and then the next interrogator.
	Just like, you know, like a conveyor belt in a car industry plant.
	And...
	And how do they keep you awake?
	I mean, after a couple of days, you must have been like falling asleep at every second.
	Correct, correct.
	So they put me back in my cell and then they let me lie down and then the guard kept banging every like one hour or so they come and bang at my door and it's so cold you cannot sleep because freezing cold in the cell and I didn't have proper clothes so it was To be honest,
	the recollection is really hazy because I was not in the state of mind to remember.
	I may have very false, a lot of false memories, but I can only tell you with the best of my guess what went on.
	And Later on, they made very efficient methods, the most efficient.
	I know this is bad because other people who would like to torture people, they would know this.
	But I can tell you, very efficient.
	Every hour, they wake me up and they make me drink water.
	Every hour.
	Wake you up, make you drink water.
	You can never sleep when someone does this to you.
	Because you will always go to the bathroom continuously.
	You will be half asleep, going to the bathroom, half asleep, going to the bathroom, half asleep, going over and over and over.
	The only method they didn't do to me, and the guy told me about it because I confessed, falsely confessed, was shower.
	He told me, and the other detainer, they put him under the shower, and they turned on the shower 24-7.
	I wasn't looking forward to that.
	So I didn't know because I kept negotiating my torture.
	I kept telling them I'm dying, you know, and actually it was true because Gul Rahman died, another detainer.
	This is on record.
	Gul Rahman, you can look it up.
	He died in the cold room.
	He couldn't take it because hypothermia set in.
	And they found him dead in his cell.
	And so the room was artificially cooled?
	Yes, yes.
	But I have to say this, they didn't bring, to my mind, they didn't bring special equipment to cool it down.
	They just completely cranked up the AC to its fullest.
	You know?
	Because the AC was not designed to kill people.
	But I do believe that where you grow up, I'm sure a Canadian will not die under an AC, but a Mauritian like me, growing up in the desert, it's very harmful to them because my body is not used to this type of temperature.
	And I kept telling them, you are killing me.
	And I remember this doctor because when I say like, These things I'm saying with love, because I know American people are good people, just like any, like Canadian, like Mauritanian, by and large are good people.
	And I remember this doctor, I think he's a commander in the Navy.
	He was a doctor.
	And part of the program, torture program, I'm not allowed to take medication, okay?
	For pain relief, because that would defeat the purpose of the torch.
	But I was really very sick because of my sciatic nerve.
	And they took me to this doctor, commander.
	He has a leaf.
	I think they called it a commander.
	And he looked at them.
	He said, remove the shackles.
	And then they removed.
	He said, do not give me detainees with shackles on my table.
	Something like that.
	He was very upset.
	And then I saw my window.
	I said, oh, this is a good guy.
	I need to complain.
	You know, I was like drowning and I was just seeing anything.
	I said, I'm really doing, I'm having so much pain.
	I really needed to talk to them to stop this.
	He told me I cannot.
	He told me that he cannot interfere with interrogation.
	You know, but he would write a report that I'm really very sick.
	And he did write the report.
	And the reason why I know he did, because years later on, my interrogators found the report in their discovery.
	Discovery means when your lawyer asks for secret documents related to your case.
	But I was just like doing nothing.
	I let them do their things.
	I'm not talking to them.
	Nothing.
	Just like a stone every day.
	And sometimes, I say a little when they like, be nice to me, but say something that has nothing to do with anything.
	And one day, it was, I think, August 23rd, when I remember correctly, of 2003.
	August 23rd.
	A man...
	A police lieutenant by the name of Richard Zouli, later on I learned he's from Chicago, and he's very infamous because he was involved in torturing some people back in Chicago, in the US mainland.
	He came to me, and I sat in front of him.
	He was very stern, very serious, and he handed me a letter from DOD, and he asked me to read it.
	In that letter, it says that due to the lack, something like due to the lack of my cooperation, the U.S. government has had no choice but to arrest my mother and put her in only man prison.
	And that they know that I was involved in millennial plot and in the atrocious acts of 9-11, et cetera, et cetera.
	I didn't know how to answer, because I was very scared.
	I told him, this is unfair.
	I didn't know what to say.
	And he told me, we are not looking for justice.
	We are trying to stop people from driving planes into the buildings.
	Something like that.
	I'm sure his English is much better than mine.
	And I was like, okay, go ahead and look for those people.
	So when he left, I knew I had nothing more to lose and I was ready to confess to everything and anything.
	But I didn't know how.
	I didn't know how to start it.
	But he helped me.
	So, I don't know, a couple of days later on, or one day, I don't remember, I was in the interrogation room with Staff Sergeant Mary.
	You know, Mary, you know, she has her humane side, even though she actively Participate in torture, notably in sexual assault.
	You know, she was kind of, you know, at least ambivalent about what she was doing.
	And these, like, three masked men came to the room, and then one of them was holding a German Shepherd, And the other star just putting me down, beating me everywhere, like viciously beating me.
	And then she stood up and she was crying.
	She was like, why you do this?
	Why you do this?
	It was like total chaos.
	Then they took me out of the room, never stopped beating me until I stopped breathing because I couldn't breathe anymore because my ribs broke.
	And it was like the...
	The pressure on my on my lungs and the pain of breathing through your broken ribs is just so so painful and I was like all the time and they were like making fun of this noise I couldn't see anything you know then they took me they start putting this water You know, forcing this salt water.
	My nose, my mouth.
	Then they gave me to another team.
	I don't know, three hours, and then another team.
	And Richard Zouli stood.
	I could hear him in the pause before they gave me to the next team.
	He was like, kind of, we appreciate the cooperation of all countries to take down the terrorists, something like that, you know.
	And this guy with Egyptian accent, his English was very poor.
	And another guy from Syria, he only spoke Arabic.
	I would say Syrian accent to be precise because there was no way for me to know he is Egyptian.
	No, no, Jordanian accent.
	So they took me.
	And those people utilized a different technique.
	So what they did, they strapped me on a chair.
	Very, very strong chair.
	And then they put something over my body.
	Overall, I believe.
	And then they start beating me, beating me, until I couldn't take anymore.
	They fill everything with ice.
	Everything.
	Then when the eyes start to melt, they come back and beat me.
	And they were saying that I will confess, and so, and they are going to take me to Egypt and to Jordan.
	In my mind, I was thinking, but I've been to Jordan and no miracles happen, so why they take me again to Jordan?
	And one thing in my mind, since Richard Zouli meeting, I want to confess.
	I want to say everything, but I didn't know how to do it.
	Honestly, that was only my problem.
	They...
	So they took me around 5.30 p.m.
	And...
	About 1.30 in the morning, next day, because I saw the watch of the medic as he started to treat me.
	So he came, they put me in a cell, and the medic, you know, was masked, and they say, when you, I can do this and that, I'm going to break your teeth.
	So he was part of the torture team.
	You know, so much for do no harm.
	And so he treated me actually.
	So he put like some band-aid around my ribs.
	A lot of it.
	And he gave me a lot of medication.
	I don't know what it was.
	And then this was August 24th or 25th.
	I don't remember.
	So how long had you been there by then?
	No, this is a new prison.
	So this is a new prison.
	The night I came, this is a new prison.
	So I stayed there almost until one year before my release or two years before my release.
	So what I remember vividly are two things.
	So this is August, and the second thing I remember, October 10th.
	October 10th.
	Because I saw a watch.
	You know, again, the interrogator was sitting and then looked briefly at his watch, and then I saw the date.
	But just before that, you know, I was...
	I cannot describe to you how much pain I was in because I cannot, there are no words.
	I'm alone.
	I don't know where.
	I don't know days or nights.
	They start this diet manipulation.
	They make me, they withhold food for I don't know how many days until I almost die.
	And they give me a lot of, like, amory, amory meal ready to eat.
	Very bad food, at least to me.
	But I cannot eat it because when I'm depressed, I cannot eat.
	And they give to me and they give me one minute, but they don't respect the minute.
	I think they give 20 seconds and they take everything back.
	But I'm happy because I don't want to see them.
	I just want, like, to pass and die without pain.
	You know, something like that.
	And so I start in myself to sing.
	Like, Quran, when they're like to sing, to...
	Just to feel good, like pray and so.
	And they came to me with force.
	They said, if I pray again, they will beat me up.
	And then they force feed me.
	When Ramadan came, they come during the day and force feed me.
	I didn't know it was...
	I know somehow it's Ramadan, but...
	And actually, I know somewhere during the day.
	I know somewhere during the day.
	Why?
	When I go to the bathroom, I look inside the bathroom, and I could see the light of the day through the plumbing.
	And that's the time when they force-feed me.
	Very little, just to make sure I'm not respecting Ramadan.
	So that's only, I'm just trying to put you in the picture to understand how destroyed my spirit was.
	Then I did this prayer and I asked Allah for guidance, i.e.
	God, because I didn't know what to do.
	And in my mind, nothing I would tell them would stop this.
	I called one of the guards.
	I don't know their names, their masks too.
	And I said, I need to see Captain Collins.
	Richard Zouli called himself Captain Collins.
	That's what he called himself.
	And he came to me and I told him, I want to confess.
	He said, okay, I will send you the people.
	And he sent me First Sergeant Shelley.
	And First Sergeant Shelley started asking me.
	And then I was just like, no stop.
	Asked me, do you know like Jordan Peterson?
	Yes, he's a terrorist.
	I know him.
	I saw him.
	He was preparing, you know.
	Everybody I know is a bad guy.
	And So, and then, you know, because interrogation is a technique.
	They don't ask you the hard question in the beginning.
	They always start softly, where did you study?
	What school did you go to?
	You know, to prep you up.
	And then they said, everything you said is good.
	We appreciate your cooperation, everything.
	But You need to tell us something that would put you in prison, because everything you said, America, he told me, is a very liberal country, and they need hard evidence.
	And then he said, you were in Canada, you may have wanted to attack the CN Tower.
	The only problem, I didn't know what CN Tower was, nor did I know where.
	And then he said, like, in Toronto.
	And then I said, yes.
	And it made sense to everything.
	So I said, okay.
	And he confronted me with a phone conversation I had in Canada.
	I think it was on 22nd, street 22nd.
	You know, I was living with my friend Mohsin, because I didn't have an apartment.
	This was in Montreal?
	Correct.
	I love Montreal, by the way.
	It's beautiful.
	The streets.
	I never saw in my life a street that is 4,500.
	You know Europe?
	The longest street in Germany is 150 or 200.
	That's it.
	But I remember Jean Talon.
	4,532.
	What kind of street is that?
	Like, one say, oh, I live in Jean Talon.
	My friend lives in Jean Talon.
	Oh, you guys close.
	No, we are not close.
	So it was 22nd.
	And we were leaving.
	And then, you know, we like tea in Mauritania, at least this culture.
	We appreciate tea.
	And it was, I think, 9 p.m.
	And it was really cold.
	This is December, late December.
	And it was really cold, and I really liked tea.
	And this guy, our neighbor, he wants to come over and drink tea.
	And I said, could you please, you know, swing by the Depaneur?
	You know, this is Depaneur, it's...
	Cornerstone.
	Yes, yeah.
	Could you please swing by and get us some sugar?
	Tea?
	Yeah, sugar, I think.
	I didn't have sugar.
	And then they kept asking me, they intercepted this conversation, what do you mean when you say tea and sugar?
	And I would say, I meant tea and sugar.
	Wrong answer.
	So in this confession, I told them that tea and sugar are explosive.
	So we just give them this nickname.
	That's where I built the bomb.
	And they said, okay, why did you meet this guy?
	I said, this guy helped me.
	So everybody had a role.
	So now everything made sense to them because all the guys around were bad people.
	And now they had a job.
	So they gave money.
	We brought these from Chechen smugglers.
	And I put everything in the confession.
	And they asked me to sign the confession.
	and I did sign the confession you know and so what was happening behind the scene was I was being designated for death penalty so And the guy who took the case was Colonel Couch, US Marines.
	And he was like a very decent person.
	I mean, he told them, this doesn't make sense to me.
	He denied everything.
	And from one day to the next, he said, no more denial?
	What's going on?
	Then they wouldn't tell him anything.
	And then he made an investigation on his own and he found out I was heavily tortured.
	And then he resigned.
	He resigned.
	And later on, they give the case to Colonel Morris Davis.
	They call him Morris Davis.
	Air Force Colonel.
	I know him.
	We are friends now.
	And he...
	So they said, okay, we need to put this guy on lie detector.
	So because...
	The team who was interrogating him, they said they have the gold nugget, a confession, from a very bad guy.
	And the analyst said, BS. He didn't do this.
	This is BS. Whatever you did to him, we don't know, but this is what he said is BS. So they came to me and they put me on This lie detector.
	I said, guys, I'm an engineer.
	I cannot go through this because I will tell the truth.
	And then they said, it doesn't matter, you have to.
	And then I was so scared because now with the confession, I had the status of admitted criminal.
	And I had the right to eat, I had the right to pray, I had the right to sleep for the first time.
	I didn't care what they did to me after that.
	And then now I was so scared to go back to torture when I deny everything.
	But they told me this was coming from very high level people in the government that I need.
	Then I remember one of the question, did you ever plot or conspire to plot against the US? And I said, And Canada.
	And the guy told me, I don't give a shit about Canada.
	I was like, good for you.
	In my head, because I couldn't say that, you know.
	You know, this is like Very, like, Americans.
	I'm sure you understand because you're North American.
	You know, this is, you know, very American.
	And I was so happy because I was so upset with Canada.
	So upset.
	Like, if you tell me, are you more upset than the U.S. or Canada?
	I would say Canada.
	Because I was a landed immigrant in Canada.
	And they scared me so much instead of protecting me.
	They threw me under the bus, you know?
	You know, they completely swallowed everything that came from the CIA, FBI, or whatnot, without doing their own investigation and say, you know what, this is a guy in our territory.
	And this is a guy, we owe him the protection.
	And we need to know if he's a bad guy, we don't protect bad guys.
	But we need to understand he's a guy.
	We need to find out.
	And so when he said that, it was like the only thing we agree on.
	Thank you.
	So, and then I passed the test from like a death penalty case to someone who didn't do anything.
	You know, I was like...
	Sorry, let me get that clear.
	So you did the lie detector test and what did it reveal?
	It revealed that your confession was false?
	Everything I said that was incriminating was false.
	Have you ever conspired?
	Yeah, have you ever conspired?
	Did you ever talk to anyone about harming the US? Never.
	Nothing.
	Okay, so during the lie detector test, you told the truth about everything?
	Yes.
	I see, I see.
	And so that nullified your confession?
	Yes, I denied everything and truthfully.
	So they took the test and they fought over it.
	They said they had one of them insisted to come next day or next week and to do again the test.
	They did the test again and again I passed the test.
	So all of those tests are now in my hands on my computer because my lawyer gave them to me and they were presented at the court.
	At my court.
	So I was there.
	So the torture effectively stopped.
	It stopped at the end of 2000.
	Early 2004, there was no more torture.
	So you were in the torture prison for two years, if I got that timeline right?
	No, no, no.
	Okay.
	The intensive torture was between June of 2003 and early 2004.
	A little bit over half a year.
	Okay, and tell me again, when you were brought to Guantanamo Bay, tell me when you arrived there?
	I arrived August 5th of 2003.
	Two, not three, yes.
	But what happened is that they just didn't know what to do with me.
	And I was just there.
	And they wouldn't release me, and they wouldn't take me to trial.
	They wouldn't release me because they thought I witnessed so much, I saw so much, and they didn't want me to reveal it.
	At least that's my understanding of that of my lawyers.
	And second, they couldn't take me to any trial because there was no crime to be tried.
	That was the conclusion of Moore Davis.
	And he wrote this in a memorandum.
	He said, there is no evidence This guy did anything against us.
	And on record, he said that.
	And so you have to forward.
	So then I started making friendship with guards and with interrogators, you know, I just start to be, you know, an inmate.
	You know, I start like, you know, the guards start to be my friends, and they introduce me to American pop culture, music, you know, when they bring books, I borrow from them the books.
	So did they realize at that point, did they treat you as if you were innocent?
	Apart, obviously, they didn't release you, but your treatment radically improved.
	So did they believe you, your guards and so on?
	That's very hard to, you know, because we didn't speak about my innocence or my guilt.
	You know, they...
	because it was like a taboo topic almost.
	I didn't feel comfortable to talk about it because it's so...
	Cliché for the 10th person to say I'm innocent.
	So I don't want to be a cliché.
	Absolutely not.
	I just want whatever.
	You know, whatever.
	I'm just...
	Well, you also must have been quite relieved, I would suspect, since your days had improved substantially.
	Oh, you have no clue how relieved I was.
	But I was a mess.
	You know, because...
	You know, because I start hearing voices...
	And I start really to get very sick.
	And then they put me on two medications, Paxil and the other, Clonopy.
	And then...
	And...
	So...
	Like, most of this time I was in isolation, and then I begged them to take me out of the isolation, but they refused.
	Then after, I think, two or three years, I didn't want to see people anymore.
	And to this day, Jordan, I don't feel comfortable around people.
	I always feel comfortable when I'm alone, you know, because...
	How much time did you spend alone over those years?
	Okay.
	Okay, 2003, 2016.
	About 10 years.
	Mostly alone.
	How often would you see people?
	Just guard.
	Just, sorry, just?
	Just the guards and the staff.
	I see only the guards and the staff.
	And what sort of cell were you in?
	What was it like?
	It was like, I think, six by eight.
	No, I don't think it's six because that's...
	I think it's four, four by six.
	I don't want to pin myself, but what's maybe four by six feet, four by eight?
	Eight feet, four by eight.
	Was there a bed in it, in the cell?
	Yes, it was like a metal sheet, you know, that's made into a bed.
	You can look it up.
	You can look Guantanamo Bay prison and then you will see the cell.
	So you're alone for almost 10 years in that cell.
	Correct.
	And so how did it come to be that you got legal representation and were able to start to free yourself?
	Some UK citizen went to court because they were with us and they had good lawyers.
	Then they made it all the way to the Supreme Court.
	And then they won the right to challenge their detention.
	And I was not aware of this because I had no right even to contact anyone.
	But the family, that's the advantage of a free country.
	So UK is a free country, so their families, they fought Very much for everyone.
	And so I had, all of a sudden, I benefited from these UK citizens because the right was given to everyone.
	And in 2005, mid-2005, I met my lawyers for the first time.
	I met Nancy Hollander and Sylvia Royce.
	They came to me, and then I saw them as a window, and I started to write my story, my memoir.
	So what did you think when the lawyer showed up?
	I was so happy, you know.
	And I remember the first time they came to me, I sat on a chair like this with a desk in front of me.
	You know, it was like one of the standard interrogation roles.
	And then I stood up and then I start to say hi.
	But I couldn't, I wouldn't move because I was bolted.
	But they couldn't see the chain.
	And they were like sitting there because they were briefed that detainees are dangerous people.
	So they were scared.
	And then I was very happy, honestly.
	And how long did it take your lawyers to understand your story and, I presume, believe you?
	Yes, very long.
	Very long, because the accused is innocent until proven guilty.
	Only your mother believes this.
	People at large, and I'm sure you understand this, people perceive the accused as Well, it would be very hard for someone to believe that you had spent that long in Guantanamo Bay and weren't guilty of something.
	I mean, because they would have to question the validity of the entire system, and that's not an easy thing to do.
	And it's probably even a harder thing to do if you are from a country where rule of law is the norm.
	Correct.
	Correct.
	Yes.
	Yes.
	Absolutely.
	You know, And I mean, I can't say more than what you said.
	And I was like, okay, how can I explain to them?
	And then they were very shocked when the government, when they first compelled the government to show them, the government showed them the confession.
	He confessed.
	And then they were very upset with me.
	He said, why are you lying to us?
	And I was like, oh my...
	The government only showed them, I confess, they showed them I was tortured.
	Did they show them the lie detector results?
	Much later on, because the government holds all the cards, and then they show only the thing they want to show, you know.
	And, you know, like, democracy and the rule of law is promised That the three branches of the government cooperate with each other.
	And the executive power has so much power over judiciary In the parliament, because only the executive power has weapons, has violence, could use violence, because a judge can only tell you, you're right, you can go home, but the judge doesn't have the key to open the cell and let you go home.
	So the executive power has to cooperate and respect the judiciary.
	By and large, this function in democracies, but in the case of Guantanamo Bay, Executive power completely showed a great deal of contempt toward court system.
	So how did your lawyers free you?
	How did that happen?
	Look, this is not easy because they had to prove that I was innocent.
	Thank you.
	That was like mission impossible.
	Because they have to show the government I'm innocent.
	It's not the burden, it's not of the government.
	Because this is, and I say this very frankly and very straight, the problem with the crime they call terrorism is that it's very political, very politicized, and especially in my part of the world I can speak.
	To that, it's used to oppress peaceful, mostly peaceful political dissent and to crush them and to people who don't like just to put them in a prison because they could be your political rivals.
	Unfortunately, this playbook of the dictatorial regime in the Middle East and authoritarian regimes was copied in Guantanamo Bay and they just say you're terrorists because when someone says you're terrorists, Everything could be done against you.
	And there is no definition.
	And I have a big problem with that.
	I don't think that philosophically in a democracy, terrorism should be a crime.
	Terrorism in a democracy cannot be a crime.
	Because one, it's not clearly defined.
	Terrorists in Canada are not terrorists in Egypt.
	Terrorists in Egypt are not terrorists in Saudi Arabia.
	Terrorists in Saudi Arabia are not terrorists in Palestine and Israel, etc., etc.
	But a murderer is a murderer.
	Same thing in Canada, in the US, in Mauritania.
	If you kill someone, that's a crime, and it can be proven very easily.
	But you could be a terrorist in Egypt, and as soon as you get to Canada, you're a good citizen.
	And second, it's used for political purposes and political oppression.
	And it's used to punish people en masse.
	I can give you an example.
	Just a few months ago, the Houthi in Yemen were a terrorist group.
	And then now they are not a terrorist group anymore.
	What kind of justice is that?
	So how did your lawyers prove to the satisfaction of the people who could release you that you should be released?
	They took me to a So we fought to go to the court system.
	So I was intimidated.
	I was threatened, but I said, I'm going to court.
	In 2009, we succeeded to be heard by the late George Robertson.
	I mean, Robertson, Judge Robertson.
	And he ordered my release.
	In 2010.
	So he heard us in late 2009, ordered my list in 2000.
	And he said, there is no evidence to hold this guy.
	And the government refused.
	And then the appeal hung.
	So my book was published after a very big fight.
	And then after the publication of my book, the government said they want to review my case.
	They reviewed my case.
	They said, I'm no threat to the U.S. in 2016, July of 2016.
	And in October of 2016, they said, I can go home.
	End of story.
	Now, a movie was made out of that book as well.
	A movie, The Mauritanian.
	Please go and watch the movie and make up your own mind.
	And it's pretty accurate.
	And there is no hero in the movie, just like a bunch of people.
	And it shows, like, just, you know, the weakness of human beings.
	And your attitude towards all of this now?
	Total forgiveness.
	Because I believe in reconciliation.
	I believe that our life is too short to hold grudges and to wage wars because we need each other.
	You know, my country needs the United States and the United States could need my country.
	And we need to be brothers and sisters and we need to cooperate and make our world a better place.
	And I'm starting by Honestly and earnestly say that I hold no grudge against anyone and I'm ready to cooperate with anyone regardless of their religion, their background, their political ideology.
	And why did you come to that decision?
	Because of the diapers story I told you.
	The CIA put me in diapers and I faced death.
	I want to be a better person.
	And you hung on to that through the time that you were in Guantanamo Bay?
	Absolutely.
	I couldn't honestly express it because people could say, ah, he's just scared.
	But now I'm a freeman.
	I could say it and I'm inviting everyone I met in Guantanamo Bay to come to me.
	Some people came to me and we drank tea.
	They stayed at my home, one of the guards.
	Steve Wood, he came to me three times and I hosted him in my humble home.
	And why did he come to see you, do you think?
	We became friends.
	We became good friends.
	You know, he's the godfather of my child.
	I'm the godfather of his daughter.
	And we just want to be friends and to show Everyone that, you know, peace can be made.
	We don't need to hold garages.
	Is there anything else you want to say?
	I would like to say I'm so honored to be on your show and I thank you so much to give me your platform and allow me to share my story with your audience.
	Well, thank you for walking through it.
	I'm sure that's far from pleasant to do that.
	You have no clue.
	Yes.
	Thank God for that.
	Mohamedou, it was very good of you to talk with me.
	I wish you the best.
	Thank you so much.
	And please take care of yourself and get healthy.
	It's the most important thing.
	Much appreciated.
	Thank you.

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