A Yemeni captive at the Guantanamo Bay prison admitted he was Osama bin Laden’s $200-a-month driver in Afghanistan, but said he was neither a member of Al Qaeda nor a terrorist, his Pentagon-appointed lawyer said Tuesday.
Salim Ahmed Salim Hamdan, 34, is held in isolated accommodations for prisoners facing possible U.S. military tribunals, said his lawyer, Navy Lt. Cmdr. Charles Swift.
“He fully admits that he was an employee of Osama bin Laden” from 1997 until the U.S. attack on Afghanistan in 2001, Swift said. “But he adamantly denies that he was ever a member of Al Qaeda or engaged in any terrorist attack. He worked for Osama bin Laden solely for the purpose of supporting himself and his family.”
Swift spoke about Hamdan for the first time in an exclusive interview. Pentagon policy has prohibited troops and civilians at the detention camp in eastern Cuba from disclosing specifics about the more than 600 prisoners.
More Top Picks Best Pergolas For Backyard
He obtained special Pentagon clearances to discuss his client, whom he has met for about 25 hours using an Arabic translator.
Starting in 1997, Hamdan, the father of two young daughters, worked for bin Laden on his farm in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar, and drove a pickup truck. He sometimes ferried farm workers to the fields as well as transported bin Laden across Afghanistan, Swift said.
Hamdan first went to Afghanistan in 1996, the lawyer said, intending to travel to Tajikistan to join Muslims who were fighting former Soviet communists. He never made the trip, but found the job with bin Laden that paid $200 a month, a huge sum for a poor Yemeni in impoverished Afghanistan.