Muhammad Ismail Agha
Guantanamo detainees known to have been released
Muhammad Ismail Agha (born 1988 or 1989) is an Afghan national who was among some 15-21 juveniles held at the Guantanamo Bay detention camps. He is believed to be 13 or 14 years old when arrested by Afghan soldiers. Detained without charge, he was released on January 29, 2004, and returned home.
He was recaptured in May 2004 during an engagement with US forces near Kandahar.
Early life
Agha was born in Durabin (also written as Doorbini), a poor farming village near Nawzad, Afghanistan. There is some confusion about his date of birth: U.S. Department of Defense records indicate he was born in 1988, while first-hand reports suggest it was 1989.[a]
He helped his father, Hayatullah, as a builder, before leaving his village to look for construction work in December 2002.
Detention in 2002
Shortly after leaving home to look for work in December 2002, Agha was detained by Afghan soldiers in Girishk for attempting to join the Taliban to fight against Americans, a charge he denied. At the time, he would have been aged between 13 and 14 years old.[b] He was then transferred to the United States at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan. During this time, he says he was held in solitary confinement and subjected to sleep deprivation and stress position, both enhanced interrogation techniques used at the time by the U.S. Armed Forces.
He was then transferred on February 7, 2003, to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.[c] He was put with two other teenagers, Naqibullah and Asadullah, in Camp Iguana, the section of Guantanamo built for juveniles.
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