Ghairat Baheer

Ghairat Baheer
Born1956 (age 67–68)
Chanakhwa, Paktika
Arrested2002
Islamabad, Pakistan
CitizenshipAfghanistan
Detained at the salt pit, BTIF
Alleged to be
a member of		Hezbi Islami Gulbuddin
Statusreleased
OccupationSenator in the House of Elders - Afghanistan

Ghairat Baheer is a citizen of Afghanistan who served as a Senator in the House of Elders of Afghanistan.[1] He is also the Chairman of the Political Committee of Hezbi Islami in Afghanistan. Ghairat Baheer was held by American forces in extrajudicial detention for over six years.[2] The BBC News reported Pakistani officials took him into custody during a pre-dawn raid on his home in Islamabad on October 30, 2002.[3] The BBC said no reason was offered for his apprehension, and that there were rumors US security officials participated in the raid.

After his release in May 2008 Baheer asserted he had spent six months in the salt pit, one of the Central Intelligence Agency's network of clandestine interrogation centers.[4][5][6][7] He spent the rest of his detention in the Bagram Theater Internment Facility in Afghanistan.

According to the Associated Press Baheer is a medical doctor, a son-in-law of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, the leader of the Hezbi Islami Gulbuddin previously a militant group, and that he was captured with Gul Rahman, the only captive the CIA has acknowledged died in captivity.[4] In 2010 Baheer was a member of the Hezbi Islami Gulbuddin peace delegation to peace talks.

In an interview with the German news agency DPA Bahir said he spent most of his six years in captivity in chains, bombarded with disorienting music so loud his guards wore hearing protection.[7] He said they were fed an inadequate quantity of food, and he lost 40 kilograms, and he still hadn't fully recovered his strength.

In 2012 he served as the HiG's main negotiator with the United States.[8][9][10]

David Loyn, of the BBC News, quoting sources close to new President of Afghanistan Ashraf Ghani, reported that Ghairat Baheer had been offered a position in his new cabinet.[11] Baheer, former Taliban Minister of Foreign Affairs, Wakil Ahmad Muttawakil, and former Taliban Ambassador to Pakistan Abdul Salem Zaeef, were offered the Ministries of Minister of Rural Affairs, Minister of Border Affairs and Minister of Religious Affairs.

On June 14, 2018, Baheer addressed 180 members of the Hezbi Islami Party, who had just been released from prison, following the peace negotiations he had helped lead.[12] He urged the men, on behalf of the party, to be peaceful, law-abiding citizens.

Ghairat Baheer was sworn in as a Senator and a member of the House of Elders on September 16, 2018.[1] He was selected for the senate as part of the one third members that the President is entitled to appoint. He is also currently the Chairman of the Political Committee of Hezbi Islami in Afghanistan.

References

  1. ^ a b Khwaja Basir (2018-09-16). "Aminzai, Baheer & Azimi sworn in as new senators". Pajhwok News Agency. Kabul. Archived from the original on 2019-04-12. Retrieved 2019-04-12. Dr. Ghairat Baheer, Dr. Bakhtar Aminzai and Amanullah Azimi were introduced to the upper house by President Ashraf Ghani.
  2. ^ Amber Hildebrandt (2011-09-27). "Detained Canadian a 'casualty of war on terror': Questions raised about delay in consular help". CBC News. Archived from the original on 2011-09-27. Retrieved 2011-09-27. A former detainee who knew the Canadian-Egyptian inside Bagram, Ghairat Baheer, said Ismail's Western attitudes and habits irritated other Muslim detainees. Baheer, who spent four years in the detention facility, said Ismail told him he was "not captured as a fighter or a warrior" and was travelling in Afghanistan at the time.
  3. ^ "Afghan warlord's relative 'arrested'". BBC News. 2002-10-30. Archived from the original on 2015-10-16. Retrieved 2012-08-28. Ghairat Baheer was taken from his house in Islamabad early on Tuesday, an unnamed Pakistani police officer told the Reuters news agency. It is not clear exactly why he has been detained.
  4. ^ a b Adam Goldman, Kathy Gannon (2010-03-28). "Death shed light on CIA 'Salt Pit' near Kabul: Handling of terror suspect led to inquiry by agency's inspector general". MSN. Archived from the original on December 23, 2017. Retrieved 2011-09-27. Baheer, who said he spent six months in the Salt Pit during six years in Afghan prisons, said in an interview in Islamabad that he never learned what happened to Rahman. Rahman's family repeatedly pressed International Red Cross officials about his fate, Baheer said. "If he died there in interrogation or he died a natural death they should have told his family and ended their uncertainty," Baheer said.
  5. ^ Adam Goldman, Kathy Gannon (2010-04-06). "CIA prisoner said to have once rescued Karzai: Suspected insurgent froze to death while in U.S. custody in 2002". MSN. Retrieved 2011-09-27. Rahman was captured about three weeks before his death in a raid in the Pakistani capital of Islamabad against Hezb-e-Islami, an Afghan insurgent group led by Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, which was believed to have ties to al-Qaida. Rahman was arrested along with Hekmatyar's son-in-law, Dr. Ghairat Baheer.
  6. ^ "Gulbuddin Hekmatyar's spokesman and son-in-law freed in Kabul: He was taken for meetings with President Karzai". RAWA. 2008-05-30. Archived from the original on 2012-10-01. Retrieved 2011-09-27. Ghairat Baheer, also son-in-law of Hekmatyar, was kept in detention by Pakistan for two years and was later handed over to the Afghan authorities, Hizb-e-Islami sources said.
  7. ^ a b Nadeem Sarwar (2011-09-01). "Afghan man recollects being chained in US "dark prison"". Monsters and critics. Archived from the original on 2013-01-29. Retrieved 2012-08-28.
  8. ^ Zulfiqar Ali (2012-02-01). "Ice breaks between US, Hizb-i-Islami". Dawn. Archived from the original on 2012-11-23. Mr Baheer said that he met CIA chief Gen (retired) David Petraeus, Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Nato Commander John R. Allen on recent visit to Kabul and discussed with them the situation in war-torn Afghanistan.
  9. ^ "HIA will never make deal on Islamic identity". Frontier Post. 2012-04-19. Archived from the original on 2012-10-21. Terming their recently concluded five-day visit to Afghanistan successful, chairman of the political committee of the Hizb-i-Islami Afghanistan (HIA), Dr Ghairat Baheer Wednesday said they would never make any deal on the Islamic identity, independence and national integrity of Afghanistan.
  10. ^ Tahir Khan (2012-08-24). "Afghan reconciliation: Saudis spring into action in face of US-Taliban impasse". Pak Tribune. Archived from the original on 2012-08-26. Retrieved 2012-08-28. A Taliban delegation led by former Afghan consul-general in Peshawar, Maulvi Najibullah, and a three-member Hizb-e-Islami delegation led by Dr Ghairat Baheer, in charge of political affairs of Hizb-e-Islami, recently visited Saudi Arabia to hold informal talks with kingdom officials, diplomats familiar with the talks said, requesting anonymity.
  11. ^ David Loyn (2015-01-09). "Taliban 'reject offer of Afghan government posts'". Afghanistan: BBC News. Archived from the original on 2019-04-08. Retrieved 2015-03-31. The three men whom President Ghani had hoped to draw into his government were Mullah Zaeef, the former Taliban ambassador to Pakistan, who has lived relatively openly in Kabul for some years, Wakil Muttawakil, the former Taliban foreign minister, and Ghairat Baheer, a close relative of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, whose forces are allied to the Taliban.
  12. ^ Gulabuddin Ghubar (2018-06-14). "Government Frees 180 Hizb-e-Islami Prisoners". Tolo News. Archived from the original on 2018-06-14. Retrieved 2019-04-12. "Hizb-e-Islami leadership expects that you (released inmates) become patriotic citizens for this country," said Ghairat Baheer, head of Hizb-e-Islami-Government Peace Accord Commission.