19 Facts About Ghassan al-Sharbi

Ghassan Abdallah Ghazi al-Sharbi was born on 28 December 1974 and is a Saudi citizen who was held in extrajudicial detention in the United States Guantanamo Bay detention camps, in Cuba.

In 2006, Ghassan al-Sharbi told a military commission that he was a member of al-Qaeda and proud of his actions against the United States.

Al-Sharbi had a habeas corpus petition which his father had initiated on his behalf; when it reached the court in March 2009, Ghassan al-Sharbi requested that it be dismissed.

The US Department of Defense reports that Ghassan al-Sharbi was born on December 28,1974, in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

Ghassan al-Sharbi was sent to the United States for high school and later graduated from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott, Arizona with a degree in electrical engineering.

Ghassan al-Sharbi was captured in March 2002 by Pakistani forces during a raid at Faisalabad, Pakistan.

Ghassan al-Sharbi was held in Islamabad for two months before being turned over the United States forces.

Ghassan al-Sharbi spoke fluent English and was considered "dismissive and aloof" by the interrogators.

Ghassan al-Sharbi offered the names, addresses and phone numbers of several American classmates, professors and landlords who he said would vouch for his having done nothing wrong.

Ghassan al-Sharbi stated that he was glad to see the Taliban ruling Afghanistan, quoting statistics that showed a dramatic decrease in crime rates and an increase in new schools built under their government.

The interrogator later remarked that Ghassan al-Sharbi wanted to assert superiority and had a "seeming preoccupation with death".

In 2002, Ghassan al-Sharbi was transferred to the United States Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba.

In 2006, his pro bono attorney, Bob Rachlin, was trying to arrange for Ghassan al-Sharbi to talk by phone with his parents, hoping they would persuade him to accept Rachlin's legal assistance, which his father had initiated.

Ghassan al-Sharbi was alleged to have been part of a bomb-making cell.

Ghassan al-Sharbi speculated that the Prosecution's dropping of the charges, and plans to subsequently re-file charges was intended to counter and disarm the testimony Vandeveld was expected to offer, that the Prosecution had withheld exculpatory evidence in relation to each of the men.

The report stated Ghassan al-Sharbi was subjected to the "frequent flyer" program from November 2003 to February 2004.

Ghassan al-Sharbi said the detainee had often expressed disdain for the United States process and was "an aspiring martyr".

Ghassan al-Sharbi promised the use of torture would cease at the camp.

Ghassan Abdallah Ghazi al-Sharbi was one of the 71 individuals deemed too innocent to charge, but too dangerous to release.