Abdul Haq (Uighur)

From Citizendium, the Citizens' Compendium

For more information, see: Uighur detainees in Guantanamo.

Abdul Haq is a member of the Uighur ethnic group who directed a camp of Uighurs in the Tora Bora mountains in Afghanistan.^[1] The camp was bombed in October 2001, and the approximately two dozen Uighurs who survived the bombing fled. Most of them were captured when they fled to Pakistan, and were held in extrajudicial detention.

During their Combatant Status Review Tribunals they faced allegations that they were tied to the the East Turkistan Islamic Movement, that they completed military training at this camp, and that they were tied to the Taliban. They responded by saying that the camp was composed entirely of Uighurs, that they had received minimal amount of training on the AK-47, from Haq and another Uighur named Hassan Maksum, and that most of what they did there was construction work.

During his CSR Tribunal testimony Huzaifa Parhat confirmed that Abdul Haq was the camp's leader.^[2] He confirmed he had seen Hassan Maksum who the Tribunal officers described as "an important gentleman in the Uighur community", meet twice with Abdul Haq. When he was asked to address the "concern that Mr Hassan Maksum may have relationships with al Qaida people". He replied "I don't think so. The people in Turkistan will not associate with al-Qaida."

References

1. ↑ Summarized transcripts (.pdf), from Abdullah Abdulqadirakhum'sCombatant Status Review Tribunal - pages 26-39
2. ↑ OARDEC (date redacted). Summarized Statement (ISN 320, Hufaiza Parhat) pages 43-54. United States Department of Defense. Retrieved on 2008-04-10.