The first visual proof of a prisoner being held at a CIA black site has been uncovered in a declassified submission to a U.S. military court.
The image shows Ammar al-Baluchi, one of the individuals charged with planning the 9/11 attacks and held at Guantánamo Bay by the U.S. government.
Al-Baluchi was captured in Karachi, Pakistan in 2003 and was secretly moved to five different CIA black sites between 2003 and 2006.
According to The Guardian, the picture of the detainee within the context of the “war on terror” was obtained from Baluchi’s legal team just before it was included in a filing for the military court.
In the photo, Baluchi appears extremely thin and is believed to have been detained at Location No 7 or Detention Site Black, known as the CIA’s black site in Bucharest, Romania.
This image of Baluchi was revealed on page 7 of documents related to his trial by the military commissions at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Revealed: first picture of war on terror detainee in CIA black site https://t.co/nVdi2tCfyX
— The Guardian (@guardian) August 2, 2024
The New York Times covered the story.
Per The New York Times:
For years, defense lawyers in the Guantánamo cases have spoken of reviewing disturbing government photos of the prisoners being held by the C.I.A. in the Bush administration’s secret overseas prison, the black sites. But they were marked classified, and the world was not allowed to see them. Until now.
Lawyers in the Sept. 11 case have released a single photo taken by the C.I.A. of one prisoner, Ammar al-Baluchi, showing his gaunt, malnourished naked body, circa 2004 at an overseas prison.
The lawyers said the photo, which was first published by the Guardian newspaper, emerged through a classification review process at the military commissions, the war court at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.
