Den britiske terrorlovgivning, der tillader fængsling uden sigtelse i flere måneder, har kostet den britiske statsborger Hicham Yezza adskillige uger i fængsel over en gansle absurd anklage, der dybest set var baseret på tilstedeværelsen på hans computer af et åbenbart meget farligt dokument, der ellers er offentligt tilgængeligt og var downlaodet fra CIAs hjemmeside, som han skriver i dagens Guardian:
These laws have destroyed my life.
On May 14 I was arrested under section 41 of the Terrorism Act – on suspicion of the “instigation, preparation and commission of acts of terrorism”: an absurdly nebulous formulation that told me nothing about the sin I had apparently committed. Once in custody, almost 48 hours passed before it was confirmed that the entire operation (involving dozens of officers, police cars, vans, and scientific support agents) was triggered by the presence on my University of Nottingham office computer of an equally absurd document called the “al-Qaida Training Manual”, a declassified open-source document that I had never read and had completely forgotten about since it had been sent to me months before.
Rizwaan Sabir, a politics student friend of mine (who was also arrested), had downloaded the file from the US justice department website while conducting research on terrorism for his upcoming PhD. An extended version of the same document (which figures on the politics department’s official reading list) was also available on Amazon. I edit a political magazine; Rizwaan regularly sent me copies of research materials he was using, and this document was one.
Within hours of my incarceration I had lost track of time. I often awoke thinking I had been asleep for days only to discover it wasn’t midnight yet. My confidence in the competence (and motives) of the police ebbed away. I found myself shifting my energies from remaining cheerful to remaining sane. In the early hours, I was often startled by the metallic toilet seat, crouched in the corner like some sinister beast.
Men er det ikke det værd, hvis det så engang ender med, at vi får fanget nogen tæoister? Yezza advarer om, at vi ikke må undervurdere den tortur det er, pludselig at blive indespærret uden grund:
I’m constantly coming across efforts being made to give detention without charge the Walt Disney treatment: the crushing weight of solitary confinement is painted as a non-issue; the soul-sapping nothingness of the claustrophobic, cold cell is portrayed as a mild inconvenience. Make no mistake: the feeling that one’s fate is in the hands of the very people who are apparently trying to convict you is, without doubt, one of the most devastating horrors a human being can ever be subjected to. It is (to misquote Carl von Clausewitz) the continuation of torture by other means.
“Those who have nothing to hide, have nothing to fear,” goes the tautological reasoning of the paranoia merchants calling for harsher, ever more draconian “security” measures – as we saw throughout the 42-days debate. They should read Kafka: nothing is more terrifying than being arrested for something you know you haven’t done. Indeed, it is the innocent who suffers the most because it is the innocent who is tormented the most. The guilty calculates, triangulates, anticipates. The innocent doesn’t know where to start. The answers and the questions are absolute, unbreachable, towering conundrums.
Men er det ikke at gøre for meget ud af det – han bliver anholdt, kendt uskyldig, renset og løsladt, og så er den potte ude. Har det ikke været det hele værd, så, hvis den samme procedure kunne forhindre et angreb eller to? Hicham Yezza, der betegner sig selv som en intellektuel, der pludselig så hele sin eksistens mistænkeliggjort (“a vocal opponent of the Iraq war yet owns all of Christopher Hitchens’ writings; admires Terry Eagleton yet defends Martin Amis; interviews Kazuo Ishiguro, listens to Leonard Cohen, goes to Radiohead concerts”), tegner et noget mere dystert billede af den grundløse isolationsfængslings konsekvenser:
Outside, lives are shattered, jobs are lost, marriages are destroyed, minds are damaged, friends and families are traumatised – often irrevocably so. My parents, whom I wasn’t allowed to call, could barely get any sleep throughout the ordeal. Many of my Muslim university friends were, and still are, worried about being targeted themselves. For most of my loved ones, despite my innocence, nothing will ever be the same again. I’m now jobless, facing destitution and threatened with deportation from the country I’ve called home for nearly half my life.
Dystert, og desværre kun alt for overbevisende. Go read!
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