Jamal Yahya Al-Gharawi, the latest Saudi detainee in Iraq to return home, has urged officials to intervene and devise a pragmatic plan to bring home other Saudis who are still in Iraqi prisons.
In a telephone conversation with a local newspaper, Al-Gharawi, who was at Abu Dhabi airport en route back to the kingdom, said that despite the authenticity of abuse reports published in the media, they unfortunately had an adverse and harmful affect on the detainees.
He recalled the increased frequency of attacks with each updated report in the media. He also stressed that many of the detainees were fully stripped of their rights and subject to numerous acts of violence.
Al-Gharawi expressed his concern regarding the safety of the remaining detainees in Iraq in light of increased media coverage on their plight and the risks of escalated violence against them in retaliation.
“The media’s exposure regarding the tortured prisoners does not help alleviate their suffering, but rather exacerbates it. Our brothers were executed, which is far worse than torture.”
The Saudi prisoner recalled his painful experience in Iraqi prisons over the last seven years and the time spent in the six different prison facilities.
Al-Gharawi was arrested in Mosul by US forces for allegedly illegally entering Iraqi territory and was subsequently sent to the notorious Abu Ghraib prison, where he spent one and a half years until the facility was closed.
After that, Al-Gharwi was transferred to an airport prison called Camp Cropper, remaining there for weeks until he was transferred to the Badush prison and then to Susa jail facility in Sulaimaniya where he completed the remaining 10 years of his sentence.
Due to his good conduct, he was transferred to a facility where soon-to-be released detainees are held to spend his remaining two years and then finally, was sent to Al-Eqamah, his last destination before being repatriated back home.
Al-Gharawi disclosed that the levels of violence against detainees varied from one prison facility to the other, noting that in prisons such as Al-Taji, torture is severe, and that in many instances the Iraqi Special Forces have beaten prisoners with sticks.
The Saudi Charge d’Affaires in Jordan, Hamad Al-Hajri, revealed earlier to Al-Watan newspaper that a delegation from the Saudi Embassy in Jordan intends to visit the Saudi detainees in Iraq in the upcoming months.
It is noteworthy that Maad Al-Obeidi, deputy Iraqi ambassador to Riyadh, revealed during an earlier meeting that the number of Saudi prisoners who are held in Iraqi prisons is recorded at 61 and that 90 percent of them were sentenced for involvement in or committing terrorist acts. He also revealed that the Iraqi embassy in Riyadh applied for permission to visit Saudi prisoners in Iraq two and a half months ago, but has yet not received a reply to their request. Furthermore, he added that during the five years he spent at the Iraqi Embassy in Riyadh, none of the officials visited the Saudi prisoners held in captivity in Iraq. Al-Obeidi also highlighted that 111 Iraqi prisoners were spending jail time in the Kingdom.
