http://m.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/25/guantanamo-files-wrong-place-time?cat=world&type=articleGuantánamo Bay files: Caught in the wrong place at the wrong timeAlmost half of 212 Afghan prisoners either innocent or forced to fight for Taliban, while foreigners were simply rounded upDavid Leigh and James Ball
guardian.co.uk, Mon 25 Apr 2011 03.46 BST
Among the most dismaying stories to emerge is that of three hapless Tajiks caught up in a roundup of foreigners in Karachi in 2002.
The trio appear to have spent almost two years being interrogated and maltreated, first at the notorious Bagram airbase, and then at Guantánamo, before being released.
The prison files reveal that they were listed as "enemy combatants" on arrival , but turned out to be entirely innocent. The then base commander, Maj-Gen Geoffrey Miller, signed reports to the US Southern Command HQ in Florida confirming that two of the men were not enemy combatants and he was having them sent home. He added: "It is undetermined as to why the detainee was transferred to GTMO."
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Umarov's story, now confirmed by the classified prison camp files, is that the three were living in a room in the University of Karachi library, and looking for work, when they were rounded up by Pakistani police and given to the Americans. A suicide bomb had exploded and at the time, the US were reported to be paying bounties of between $5,000 and $25,000 per al-Qaida prisoner.
Umarov said he had received no compensation since. He reportedly asked his interviewer: "Why did they keep a man for two years with no reason? Why? They caught me and kept me as a prisoner of war. What war, may I ask? When was I involved? I was sleeping when they came and dragged me out of my bed."
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