WORLD/PAKISTAN: UN mechanisms must intervene in the case of an 11 year-old boy in extended US/Afghan detainment

The Asian Human Rights Commission is concerned to hear from the United States Department of Justice that an 11-year old boy, and US-Pakistani Citizen, Mohammed Ahmad, has been illegally detained in Afghanistan since 17 July 2008, when his mother was allegedly arrested by the FBI. Strong attempts by his family in Pakistan and the US to gain custody of the child have failed, and with the mother extradited to the US, the condition and the whereabouts of the child are currently unconfirmed. The whereabouts of his two younger siblings, who mysteriously disappeared with the mother and son in March, 2003, are also unknown. Authorities have offered no specific information as to the location or condition of any of the children. The concern is that Ahmad may be being used as a pawn in the US/Afghanistan “war on terror” and will be kept in custody indefinitely, or that he may disappear. His rights are being abused on a breathtaking number of counts, within the knowledge of three governments, all of which have signed or ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). The AHRC demand that the children be recovered and returned to family members, and that state authorities be made accountable for their detainment. 

That this young boy has been detained at all is of extreme concern. According to article 2 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), no child should bear punishment or discrimination on the basis of the status, activities, expressed opinions or beliefs of the child’s parents. Article 3 holds that in all actions concerning children, the best interest of the child shall be a primary consideration. 

Article 37 is more specific: 
b) No child shall be deprived of his or her liberty unlawfully or arbitrarily. The arrest detention or imprisonment of a child shall be in conformity with the law.

d) Every child deprived of his or her liberty shall have the right to prompt access to legal and other appropriate assistance, as well as the right to challenge the legality of the deprivation of his or her liberty before a court or other competent, independent and impartial authority, and to a prompt decision on any such action.

A letter from the United States Department of Justice (USDJ), dated 22 August 2008, to the boy’s mother’s attorney, Ms Elizabeth M Fink, noted that Dr Aafia’s son had been in detention in Afghanistan’s Bagram prison, and that he was removed on 31 August, 2008. An eleven year old child should under no circumstances be held captive in a prison, or in a foreign land. 

Equally unacceptable is the thwarting of efforts by Master Ahmad’s family to gain access to him and his siblings. Dr Fauzia is the younger sister of Dr Aafia and a Pakistani, US-educated scientist currently living in Karachi. She has detailed a dedicated series of efforts to see the child. These include: applying for a visa for Afghanistan on 24 August; sending faxes on the 25 August to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Pakistan and the Consul General of Afghanistan in Karachi; talking personally to a high officer at the foreign office who verbally confirmed her application, and to a staff member at the Afghan consul who confirmed the same. Dr Fauzia alleges having received a phone call from an official at the Pakistani Embassy in Kabul, who privately confirmed that Master Ahmad is in Afghanistan, and that he would be provided full security and assistance in returning to Pakistan. Even so, on September 3rd Dr Fauzia alleges having received a phone call from the US State Department claiming that, as the family is “disinterested” in the child, he may be transferred to the USA. After making a quick phone call, she found out that the child had been taken away by people from Amiyat e Milli – an Afghan security force.

These facts are as disturbing as they are baffling. In the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child – which Afghanistan has ratified and the US-signed article 9, sub-article 4 states that: ‘should a child be separated from his or her parents due to detainment, it is the obligation of the State Party to hand him or her over to a family member’. The children’s grandmother is in Karachi, and their maternal uncle, an American citizen in Texas, has expressed a willingness to take them. 

For the US government to first detain Master Ahmad (and possibly his siblings) in a foreign prison, then refuse custody to the family is not only an example of gross misconduct, but suggests that darker intentions are in play. 

This is confirmed by Ahmad’s lack of contact with the outside world. For the first time since 2003, Dr Fauzia managed to speak with her nephew via a mobile phone some days back, and described the conversation. She last saw Ahmad when he was four; she took him along to a medical conference the week before he disappeared. She reported that they boy did not know his original name and said his name had been changed several times, and that each time, he had been taken somewhere else. She reported that he expressed no emotion except when shown her photo, and that when he recognized it he said ‘I know she is a doctor and my friend’. He reportedly requested to keep the picture, went into a corner of the room and started to cry. The implications of this statement are as shocking as they are confusing. 

The lack of information about the boy’s condition, or that of his siblings, leads the AHRC to call up Article 24, which demands that State Parties recognize the right of the child to enjoy the highest standard of health and article 37/ a): No child shall be subjected to torture or other cruel or degrading treatment or punishment. 

The Asian Human Rights Commission urges the governments of the US, Pakistan and Afghanistan to respect and implement the rights of minors in the true spirit of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, as signed/ratified by them. The child must be handed over to the maternal family as they have requested, and responsibility for his care and welfare must be fully accepted by his State Countries. 

The AHRC condemns the lack of transparency shown in this case of Dr Aafia and her children, and the lack of information and assistance given to the family of the missing minor while he was in state custody. When a child is in custody, it is the responsibility of the state to prove that he or she is firstly, charged with a crime, secondly, being cared for in a humane manner, and thirdly allowed contact with his or her family.  

We appeal to the international community and UN human rights mechanisms such as the Working Group on the Rights of the Child; Working Group on Arbitrary Detention; Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances; the Special Rapporteur on the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health; the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms and the Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, to intervene in the case of Master Mohammed Ahmad, age 11, currently is in the detention of Afghan-American authorities. 

It should also be noted that there is increasing concern, due to evidence given to the AHRC, that Aafia Siddiqui and the disappearance of her three children in March 2003 was the work of various state authorities – and that she has been in unregulated custody, uncharged, for five years. The implications for the disappearance of her children, and the increasing but unsubstantiated reports of children being used as tools of interrogation and blackmail for terrorist suspects, are beyond chilling. The international community must keep a vigilant watch on the methods being used by all sides in this current conflict.