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Embarrassed by Yonas Fikre’s Disclosure of Proxy Torture, FBI Pursues Punitive Prosecution

Refusing to collude with the FBI and resisting enlistment into the agency’s army of informants and agent provocateurs is proving to carry hefty consequences. The most recent case of Yonas Fikre is the latest in a string of punitive prosecutions that demonstrate the US government’s eagerness to punish Muslims for their unwillingness to become the devils’ advocates.

Yonas Fikre, an American Muslim now residing in Sweden, was tortured in the United Arab Emirates at the behest of the US government shortly after refusing to become an informant for the FBI.

On 1 May, less than three weeks after Fikre’s allegations were made public, the Justice Department charged Fikre, his brother, Dawit Woldehawariat, and a third man, Abrehaile Haile, with conspiring to hide $75.000 worth of money transfers to the UAE and Sudan from the government, all in violation of federal reporting requirements for large international financial transactions. Woldehawariat, Fikre’s brother, was also charged with failing to file a tax return in 2009 and 2010. There are no allegations of terrorism associated with the charges.

After being stranded abroad by being placed on the No-fly List, Yonas was ominously ’warned’ by a US official about a possible lack of co-operation during an initial courtship to endear his services: ‘The time to help yourself is now‘ the missive ended. Shortly after that, he was abducted and tortured.

Gadeir Abbas, a lawyer with the Council on American-Islamic Relations who has been working with Fikre, informed Mother Jones that the federal charges were retaliation for Fikre’s refusal to cooperate with the FBI.

‘It is disappointing but not surprising that the FBI is retaliating against Yonas by filing specious charges against him after they promised to make his life difficult after he refused to become their informant. While FBI agents lied to Yonas about many things, in this case, it seems that they have kept their word.’

Thomas Nelson, Fikre’s Portland, Oregon-based lawyer, told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer  that he was unaware of the charges against his client. But Abbas said he’s been in touch with Nelson since then and the two are working together to decide what to do next.

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Posted by on May 17, 2012 in News Items

 

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Yonas Fikre Believed to be Latest Victim in FBI’s Proxy Torture & Detention Program

Last June, while Yonas Fikre was visiting the United Arab Emirates, the Muslim and United States Citizen from Portland, Oregon was suddenly arrested and detained by Emirati security forces. For the next three months, Fikre claims, he was repeatedly interrogated and tortured. Fikre says he was beaten on the soles of his feet, kicked and punched, and held in stress positions while interrogators demanded he “cooperate” and barked questions that were eerily similar to those posed to him not long before by FBI agents and other American officials who had requested a meeting with him.

Fikre had been visiting family in Khartoum, Sudan, when, in April 2010, the officials got in touch with him. He agreed to meet with them, but ultimately balked at cooperating with FBI questioning without a lawyer present and he rebuffed a request to become an informant. Pressing him to cooperate, the agents told him he was on the no-fly list and could not return home unless he aided the bureau, Fikre says. The following week he received an email from one of the US officials; it arrived from a State Department address:

“Thanks for meeting with us last week in Sudan. While we hope to get your side of the issues we keep hearing about, the choice is yours to make. The time to help yourself is now.”
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Posted by on April 18, 2012 in News Items

 

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