As the Guantanamo hunger strike enters its 100th day, the number of voices, both in the US and around the world, to close the facility are growing stronger and louder.
Lawyers acting for prisoners in Guantanamo say the real figures may be higher, but officially of the 166 inmates in Guantanamo, 102 are currently on hunger strike. Of these, 30 are being force-fed through a nasal tube and three are in hospital.
The hunger strike began in February after an altercation between prisoners and guards, after guards allegedly interfered with the inmates personal belongings including the mishandling of Koran’s.
Original only a few dozen of the prisoners were refusing to eat but by the end of April the authorities in charge of Guantanamo were forced to admit that the number had jumped to 102.
On April 14th, Cindy Panuco, a lawyer for the Afghan detainee Obaidullah told RT that guards were moving prisoners from communal living into single cells under the pretext of stopping them from acquiring weapons, but almost certainly in an attempt to break their resolve and stop them hunger striking.
Feroz Abbasi, who was released from Guantanamo without charges, described how he was psychologically tortured by the Guantanamo guards.
“For some reason on the same night Iraq was bombed in March 2003, I was moved into isolation, solitary confinement, and I was there for two years. Six months of which were without sunlight,” he said.