Former Guantanamo detainee ends silence after Maldives poll

The only Maldives man ever held at the US military prison in Guantanamo Bay has ended his silence about his arrest, following the shock election defeat of veteran leader Maumoon Abdul Gayoom.
Ibrahim Fauzee, 29, told AFP in the capital Male he could now talk freely following the dismissal of Gayoom, whom he holds responsible for his prolonged incarceration at the notorious US detention centre. "I feel very angry about what happened to me. I'm not an extremist or a troublemaker," said the bearded, bespectacled Fauzee, who is now an imam at a mosque.
"I'm very happy. I can now come out and speak about my ordeal because Gayoom is not in power anymore." Fauzee was arrested in May 2002 in the Pakistani port city of Karachi, where he lived with his wife and was a student of Islamic studies at Abu Bakar University.
He said he was detained for 22 days by Pakistani authorities before being transferred to US custody and eventually flown to Cuba, where he would remain for three years. Fauzee insisted he still had no idea why he was arrested, and accused Gayoom's government of doing nothing to secure his release.
"When the US allowed Maldivian police to visit me, they tried to ask me if I planned to oust Gayoom," he said. "They didn't try to help me out of detention when they could have. That's why I hold Gayoom responsible for my prolonged stay in detention."
He said the Maldivian government had kept his arrest in Pakistan and his detention at Guantanamo a secret until some local journalists unearthed the story. "When the US finally cleared me and released me in 2005, Gayoom's people tried to trick me into saying they helped (bring about) my release," Fauzee said. Fauzee was flown home to Male in May 2005 aboard a US aircraft.
But his suffering was not yet over. Fauzee says he was constantly shadowed by Gayoom's police after being freed, forcing him into years of silence about his ordeal. He endured personal setbacks as well. His first wife, who was four months pregnant at the time of his arrest, divorced him during his incarceration. Fauzee has since re-married and now has a one-year-old boy from his second wife.
"Since I was sent back, I have never spoken to any media because I was afraid the regime will use whatever I say and arrest me again," he said. "They said there would be trouble if I spoke about the Guantanamo Bay experience with the media. I'd experienced the brutality of Gayoom's regime so I was afraid," he said.
Gayoom, Asia's longest serving leader, steered the transformation of the Maldives from a fishing-based economy to luxury tourism hotspot, but had come in for stiff international criticism over the liberal Sunni Muslim nation's human rights record.
The victor of Tuesday's presidential election, Democratic Party leader Mohamed Nasheed, was himself jailed by Gayoom for years and has called the long-time Maldives leader a dictator who violently suppressed any opposition. Fauzee - who was born on the day that Gayoom first came to power in the Maldives in 1978 - is celebrating Nasheed's surprise victory at the polls. "I really feel the air of freedom now that Gayoom is out," he said.