The 16 signatories condemn Trump’s order to detain undocumented people in military prisons.
As signed former Guantanamo prisoners, we are strongly condemning the executive orders of US President Donald Trump to expand the detention facilities for undocumented people in Guantanamo Bay.
Guantanamo is more than just a prison. It is a place where the law is warped, dignity is stripped, and suffering is hiding behind barbed wire. We lived it. We know the mass of metal doors, the weight of the shackles, and the silence of the world that has turned our eyes apart. We know what it means to enter a cage without trial, without wish, without claims.
Now, the same system that we’ve stole from our lives for years is expanding to jail immigrants. People are seeking safety and are sent to places that exist outside the laws designed to disenfranchise their rights. Guantanamo doesn’t just allow abuse. It guarantees cruelty. This executive order does not only enable fraud. It guarantees that.
Detaining immigrants in Guantanamo denies them constitutional protections and locks them in the same legal constraints that we endured. This intentional ambiguity allows abuse just as we do. You know firsthand what happens when the system is designed to break people. This is not about security. It is to use the darkness of power, control, and Guantanamo to hide yet another injustice.
This decision is a direct result of the immunity enjoyed by the United States for the crime committed in Guantanamo. They closed the prison and did not take into account its legacy, not only allowed these injustices to continue, but also allowed for expansion. Guantanamo should have been closed long ago. Instead, they are resurrected for new victims.
We refuse to remain silent. We refuse to swallow others in the same nightmare we endured. No one deserves to be thrown into a system built to erase them. We won’t stop talking. We won’t stop fighting. Guantanamo’s fear will not be repeated.
Close Guantanamo. End of indefinite detention. Stop this order.
We are not just Guantanamo survivors. We are witnesses. And we will not let the world forget.
In solidarity,
Mansoor aheadfi (gtmo441)
Moazzam Begg
Erachidi remembered
Lakhdar boumediene
Galeb Al Bihani
Hisham Sritt
Abdul Latif Nasr
sufyian barhoumi
Hussein Jafai
Abdul Almarik Abd
Ayooob Mohammed
Tarek Dergoul
Mohshin Araskari
Djamel Ameziane
Hamami Heady
Omar Deguise
The views expressed in this article are the authors themselves and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.