Twenty-one months later, the army announced that Mr. Ahmed, a Yemeni and two other prisoners were hanged simultaneously themselves.
Death in June, 2006 - the first Guantánamo - fueled a debate among military officials, who held "an act of asymmetric warfare against us" suicides by jihadists seeking martyrdom, and critics of the prison, which was interpreted as an act of desperation by men with little hope of a fair trial or release.
Since then, the other two inmates were able to kill themselves - a in 2007 and another in 2009. In this context, a collection of files of detained secret assessment obtained by the New York Times reveals that the suicide threat has created a chronic tension in the prison - a tactic frequently evoked the captives and a constant fear of their captors.
Files for approximately two dozen detainees to refer to suicide attempts or threats. Others mention informants passing on rumours that prisoner volunteered for suicide then and efforts to organize suicide attempts. Two prisoners have been surprised if it would be enough time for a person at the end of his life if create inmates blocked their cell Windows, diverting of guards who would to remove the obstacles of weighing.
Medical officials struggling to keep the hunger strikers, other officials were in constant alert signs of distress. In May 2008, an inmate ordered inmates to "cease to sing this song;" We will sing Monday when our brothers leave. "His record noted:" was assessed it meant planning of suicide attempts. " ?
Even stray remarks on suicide could have consequences. When evaluating the level of risk of prisoners, analysts noted that they would have expressed their support for suicide - reduce their chances of release.
And both parties have focused on the implications of public relations: a prisoner told others in February 2006 death of a detainee "would open in the eyes of the world and result in the closure of the base.".
In the early years of the prison, where many prisoners have experienced mental health problems, suicide attempts have been generally described as a medical problem. One involved damage to the brain after trying hang Saudi Arabia had been "treated here for depression," said its assessment of 2004. The file for another detainee with 12 "serious suicide attempts", including cutting the throat in December 2005, said that he suffers from "major depressive disorder."
Over time, however, officials seem to to take a view more wary, the documents suggest. In January 2005, a prisoner tried to hang after be placed in a cell with another inmate that he suspected of being an informant. An analyst noted that he "knows how logistics" and that "if he"attempted suicide"would be moved from his cell and outside of" the other detained.
But the death of Mr. Ahmed and two others in June 2006 was a turning point. It marked the culmination of a period of intense multiple protests and mass agitation, including an attempt unsuccessful suicide the previous month by several detainees who swallowed prescription drugs that they and others had hoarded.
Three deaths have acquired a particular reputation among critics of the prison, with some even skeptics say they were homicides. Evaluations of three men do not address how they died later.
Records, part of a collection of leak last year the organisation anti-secrecy WikiLeaks, show that men share a history of hostile behaviour, defiant toward their captors, but also that the evidence against them varies.
Mr. Ahmed was arrested in a raid on a house in Pakistan that officials believed was linked to Al-Qaeda. He was a student religious who had never been Afghanistan. Analysts believed that he was lying, his file shows, because several other detainees alleged that they had seen camps training and with members of Al-Qaeda.
The second detainee, a Saudi named Mani shaman al-Utaybi, was arrested at a Pakistani checkpoint, in a taxi with four other men all hiding under burqas. He said that he was a preacher for an Islamic missionary group, an organization officials believed had sometimes helped extremists.
Said Mr. Utaybi file someone had been carrying elsewhere is the passport and made "inconsistent statements." One of the men arrested with him was a terrorist training camp - but two others had already been released. Analysts, said he knew little and recommended to send him to Saudi Arabia for continued detention.
However, the file for the third detainee, a Saudi named Yasser Talal al-Zahrani, said that freely, he admitted that he went to Afghanistan to be a jihadi fighter. He said also that he had shouted laughing "9/11 you don't forget" to a member of the staff of the prison, said a guard "it would use a knife to cut open his belly, cutting his face and then drink his blood".smiling and laughing as he said. ?
Several assessments later other inmates are references to three suicides. Such a file, for example, mentions in passing that a prisoner reported that another inmate told him "he had been approached and recruited by three inmates had committed suicide."
And the brother of Mr. Ahmed, Muhammad Yasir Ahmed Taher, who was also a prisoner until his repatriation in 2009, wrote to a member of the family representative Mr. Ahmed as"a martyr", according to an evaluation. One analyst concluded that the two brothers "regarded suicide as a continuation of their jihad against the United States."
Andrew w. Lehren contributed reporting from New York.
