subject: Longest-Running Hunger Striker Ending Strike in Guantanamo [print this page] Hunger striking is a common form of protest by prisoners at the Guantanamo Bay detention center in Cuba. But it may be coming to an end, as Gitmo's longest hunger striker has recently started to eat.
Saudi prisoner Abdul Rahman Shalabi , 34, has been on a hunger strike for more than five years to protest his imprisonment. According to court documents, he remains underweight but is now occasionally eating solid food.
Shalabi is still officially considered a hunger striker and is subject to force feeding through a nasal tube at the prison hospital, military officials revealed in the documents.
According to the Associated Press, Navy Captain Monte Bible, who is in charge of the Joint Medical Group at Guantanamo, Shalabi is sporadically agreeing to eat pasta, bread, cake, seafood, baklava, cookies, peanut butter, cheese, and ice cream.
Shalabi, who the U.S. government suspects of being a bodyguard for Osama Bin Laden, has been held at Guantanamo since 2002. In 2005, he was part of a group of roughly 200 inmates who began a hunger strike to protest conditions and prolonged confinement without trial.
The number of protesters quickly decreased as American soldiers began strapping the prisoners to restraint chairs to force feed them and isolating them from each other if they purposely vomited the liquid they had been fed, General Bantz J. Craddock told The New York Times in 2005.
Shalabi was one of the few who continued to protest, and is now suffering from a medical condition that is most likely due to malnutrition. He has been diagnosed with gastroparesis, which slows digestion.
Gastroparesis can also cause constipation, bloating and abdominal pain, but these symptoms may disappear as he begins to consume solid food, Bible told the Associated Press.
A month ago, Shalabi's attorneys filed a motion in the court for two medical specialists to come to Guantanamo to assess his medical status and to treat him. Although he has been treated by Guantanamo's own doctors, his attorney's believe that he will be more responsive to doctors who are not associated with the hospital.
According to daily medical logs, Shalabi actually began eating solid food in February. A guard reported seeing the prisoner secretly eating a granola bar, and the military reported that he later received seven Slim Jims and a pack of gum from an attorney.
Nevertheless, Shalabi's health is poor and his weight is dangerously low. When he arrived at Guantanamo eight years ago, Shalabi, who is 5 feet 6 inches tall, weighed 124 pounds. Today he weighs only 101 pounds.
By: Jasmine EnbergRead more international news at www.allmediany.com Longest-Running Hunger Striker Ending Strike in GuantanamoBy: Rose
