The
Gitmo detainees swapped for Bergdahl: Who are they?
By
CNN Staff
updated 7:55 PM EDT, Sat May 31,
2014
Khair Ulla Said Wali Khairkhwa, one of five Guantanamo Bay
detainees exchanged Saturday for Bowe Bergdahl, may have been directly
associated with Osama bin Laden.
(CNN)
-- Together with the announcement that U.S. Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl was
released after nearly five years of captivity came the news that five detainees
at Guantanamo Bay were being transferred to Qatar.
A
plane carrying the detainees left the U.S. Navy base in Guantanamo, Cuba, after
the announcement that Bergdahl, who was captured by the Taliban in Afghanistan
in 2009, had been exchanged for the five men.
Saturday's
transfer was brokered through the Qatari government, a senior Defense official
said. According to senior administration officials, Qatar agreed to take
custody of the detainees and provide assurances they would not pose a threat to
the United States, including a one-year ban from travel out of Qatar.
Two
senior administration officials confirmed the names of the five released
detainees as Khair Ulla Said Wali Khairkhwa, Mullah Mohammad Fazl, Mullah
Norullah Nori, Abdul Haq Wasiq and Mohammad Nabi Omari.
They
were mostly mid- to high-level officials in the Taliban regime and had been
detained early in the war in Afghanistan, because of their positions within the
Taliban, not because of ties to al Qaeda.
CNN
profiled them two years ago, when their names first surfaced as candidates for
a transfer as part of talks with the Taliban:
Khair
Ulla Said Wali Khairkhwa
Khairkhwa
was an early member of the Taliban in 1994 and was interior minister during the
Taliban's rule. He hails from the same tribe as Afghan President Hamid Karzai
and was captured in January 2002. Khairkhwa's most prominent position was as
governor of Herat province from 1999 to 2001, and he was alleged to have been
"directly associated" with Osama bin Laden. According to a detainee
assessment, Khairkhwa also was probably associated with al Qaeda's now-deceased
leader in Iraq, Abu Musab al Zarqawi. He is described as one of the "major
opium drug lords in western Afghanistan" and a "friend" of
Karzai. He was arrested in Pakistan and was transferred to Guantanamo in May
2002. During questioning, Khairkhwa denied all knowledge of extremist
activities
U.S.
Army Sergeant released by Taliban
Mullah
Mohammad Fazl
Fazl
commanded the main force fighting the U.S.-backed Northern Alliance in 2001,
and served as chief of army staff under the Taliban regime. He has been accused
of war crimes during Afghanistan's civil war in the 1990s. Fazl was detained
after surrendering to Abdul Rashid Dostam, the leader of Afghanistan's Uzbek
community, in November 2001. He was wanted by the United Nations in connection
with the massacre of thousands of Afghan Shiites during the Taliban's rule.
"When asked about the murders, he did not express any regret,"
according to the detainee assessment. He was alleged to have been associated
with several militant Islamist groups, including al Qaeda. He was transferred
into U.S. custody in December 2001 and was one of the first arrivals at
Guantanamo, where he was assessed as having high intelligence value.
Mullah
Norullah Noori
Noori
served as governor of Balkh province in the Taliban regime and played some role
in coordinating the fight against the Northern Alliance. Like Fazl, Noori was
detained after surrendering to Dostam, the Uzbek leader, in 2001. Noori claimed
during interrogation that "he never received any weapons or military
training." According to 2008 detainee assessment, Noori "continues to
deny his role, importance and level of access to Taliban officials." That
same assessment characterized him as high risk and of high intelligence value.
Abdul
Haq Wasiq
Wasiq
was the deputy chief of the Taliban regime's intelligence service. His cousin
was head of the service. An administrative review in 2007 cited a source as
saying that Wasiq was also "an al Qaeda intelligence member" and had
links with members of another militant Islamist group, Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin.
Wasiq claimed, according to the review, that he was arrested while trying to
help the United States locate senior Taliban figures. He denied any links to
militant groups.
Mohammad
Nabi Omari
Omari
was a minor Taliban official in Khost Province. According to the first
administrative review in 2004, he was a member of the Taliban and associated
with both al Qaeda and another militant group Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin. He was
the Taliban's chief of communications and helped al Qaeda members escape from
Afghanistan to Pakistan. Omari acknowledged during hearings that he had worked
for the Taliban but denied connections with militant groups. He also said that
he had worked with a U.S. operative named Mark to try to track down Taliban
leader Mullah Omar.
CNN's
Elise Labott and Erin McPike contributed to this report.
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