Aafia Siddiqui is a MIT-trained Pakistani Neuroscientist. She was born on 2nd March 1972 in Karachi to Mohamad Salah Siddiqui, a Neurosurgeon and Ismet Farooqi, an Islamic teacher, social worker and Charity volunteer. Her mother was prominent in religious and political circles and at one time a Parliament Member. Aafia Siddiqui is the youngest of three siblings. Her sister, Fouzia, is a Harvard-trained neurologist who worked at Sinai Hospital in Baltimore and taught at Johns Hopkins University before she returned to Pakistan.
Aafia attended school in Zambia until the age of eight and finished her primary and secondary schooling in Karachi. She went to study Neuroscience in Houston, Texas, United States in 1990 and attended the University of Houston for three semesters, then transferred to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology after being awarded a full scholarship. While she initially had a triple major in biology, anthropology, and archaeology at MIT, she graduated in 1995 with a BS in biology.
In 1995 she had an arranged marriage to anesthesiologist Amjad Mohammed Khan from Karachi, The marriage ceremony was conducted over the telephone. Khan then came to the US, and the couple lived first in Lexington, Massachusetts, and then in the Mission Hill neighbourhood of Roxbury, Boston, where he worked as an anesthesiologist at Brigham and Women's Hospital. She gave birth to a son, Muhammad Ahmed, in 1996, and to a daughter, Mariam Bint-e Muhammad, in 1998.
In 1999, while living in Boston, Siddiqui founded the Institute of Islamic Research and Teaching as a nonprofit organisation. She served as the organisation's president, her husband was the treasurer, and her sister was the resident agent. She attended a mosque outside the city where she stored copies of the Quran and other Islamic literature for distribution. She also co-founded the Dawa Resource Center, which offered faith-based services to prison inmates.
Siddiqui studied cognitive neuroscience and obtained her Ph.D from Brandeis University in 2001.In the summer of 2001, the couple moved to Malden, Massachusetts
The background of Aafia Siddiqui shows that she was from an educated and religious family, preaching Islam in the US through her Islamic Center. But the idea of a Muslim woman trying to throw some light on Islam didn’t appeal the U.S. To remove this hurdle, they devised a plan. The plan was to convict Aafia Siddiqui in a terrorism case.
After 9/11, 2001, which was basically planned to convict Muslims of terrorism, Muslims were looked upon suspiciously. In May 2002, the FBI questioned Siddiqui and her husband regarding their purchase over the internet of $10,000 worth of equipments, Khan claimed that these were for hunting and camping expeditions. This gave the couple some idea about the situation they were in. On 26 June 2002, the couple and their children returned to Karachi. But something fishy went between the FBI and Amjad Khan, he bought his safety by agreeing to let go of Aafia Siddiqui and to work in favour of FBI. In September 2002, she gave birth to the last of their three children, Suleman, and on 21st October 2002, Amjad Khan divorced her.
Now Aafia was on her own, she had to raise three children. While she was working at Aga Khan University in Karachi, she emailed a former professor at Brandeis and expressed interest in working in the US, citing lack of options in Karachi for women of her academic background. She went back to the US in search for a job on 25 December 2002 and returned on 2 January 2003. The FBI alleged that the purpose of the trip was to open a post office box for Majid Khan, whom they believed to be an al-Qaeda operative.
To push her into deeper trouble another story was launched that she married Ammar-al-Baluchi in February 2003, whose uncle Khalid Sheikh Muhammad was one of the accused in 9/11 attack, but her family denies that she married al-Baluchi. Now you can see how cleverly she was linked to Al-Qaeda. The US further alleged that Khalid Sheikh Muhammad mentioned her name during his interrogation. But they have no recorded proof of it, nor any written statement or anything to prove this statement as the truth.
On 25th March 2003, the FBI issued a global "wanted for questioning" alert for Siddiqui and her ex-husband, Amjad Khan. She was accused of being a "courier of blood diamonds and a financial fixer for al-Qaeda". Khan was questioned by the FBI, he was rewarded for being loyal to them and on the promise of further helping FBI he was released.
When Aafia found out that she was in trouble she wanted to keep herself and her children safe. She left her parents' house on March 30 with her three children. She said she was going to go to Islamabad to visit her uncle, but she never arrived. She was abducted that day from the airport. Her ex-husband Khan helped ISI in identifying her on the airport. From then on she remained in the captivity of US and Pakistan Intelligence Agency. But Amjad Khan’s task was not yet completed. To bring confusion in the case he said that he saw her in a traffic jam in 2005, but the truth is, she was in captivity at that time in Bagram Jail.
It is also worth noting, that 2003 was the year when Pervaiz Musharaf was ruling the country. Aafia was abducted in connivance with Pakistani Government. She was sold to the US by the Musharaf Regime.
On 1 April 2003, local newspapers reported, and Pakistan interior ministry confirmed, that a woman had been taken into custody on terrorism charges. The Boston Globe described "sketchy" Pakistani news reports saying she had been detained for questioning by Pakistani authorities and the FBI. However, a couple of days later, both the Pakistan government and the FBI publicly stated they were uninvolved in her disappearance. Her sister Fauzia claimed Interior Minister Syed Faisal Saleh Hayat said that her sister had been released and would be returning home "shortly". She was held Captive in Bagram Air Force Base against her will. Her sister said that Aafia Siddiqui had been raped, and tortured for five years. According to journalist and former Taliban captive Yvonne Ridley, Aafia Siddiqui spent those years in solitary confinement at Bagram as Prisoner 650. Six human rights groups, including Amnesty International, listed her as possibly being a "ghost prisoner" held by the US.
When Many of Siddiqui's supporters raised a hue and cry and claimed that Siddiqui was not an extremist and that she and her young children were illegally detained, interrogated, and tortured by Pakistani intelligence, US authorities, or both, during her five-year disappearance, the US was left with no choice but to deny that she was under captivity but was at large. But they didn’t want to release her or else she would reveal them to the world. Now they wanted to officially announce that she was under captivity so that’s how they made up a new story.
The US claimed that she was arrested in Ghazni, Afghanistan, by Afghan police, 17 July 2008, with documents and notes for making bombs plus containers of sodium cyanide and that she was held for questioning. Two FBI agents, a US Army warrant officer, a US Army captain, and their US military interpreters arrived in Ghazni the following day, on 18 July, to interview Siddiqui at the Afghan National Police facility where she was brought. They reported that they congregated in a meeting room that was partitioned by a curtain, but did not realise that Siddiqui was standing unsecured behind the curtain. Her American interrogators said she grabbed a rifle from behind a curtain and began shooting at them. Aafia Siddiqui said , she simply stood up to see who was on the other side of the curtain and startled the U.S. FBI and Army personnel, one of the startled soldiers shouted "She is loose" and then she was shot. On regaining consciousness, she said someone said "We could lose our jobs.
She was taken to U.S. military base Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan by helicopter in critical condition. When she arrived at the hospital she was rated at 3 on the Glasgow Coma Scale (close to death), but she underwent surgery without complications. Later, she claimed to her brother that when she needed medical treatment for her wounds to heal, she did not get it.
She was flown to the US On August 4, 2008, to be charged in a New York City federal court with attempted murder, and armed assault on US officers and employees.
After 18 months of detention, Siddiqui's trial began in New York City on 19 January 2010. Prior to the jury entering the courtroom, Siddiqui told onlookers that she would not work with her lawyers because the trial was a sham. She appealed the Muslims around the world, and this appeal was not for her release. She said, ‘You can see my condition, I am stripped of my clothes and Quran is laid in front of me and I get told to walk on it to get my clothes back. How can I do this? I am a Hafiz-e-Quran (I have memorized Quran). Muslims around the world! If you cannot get me released please prevent this desecration of Quran.
A lawyer for Siddiqui, Elaine Whitfield Sharp, expressed scepticism regarding both terrorism and assault charges: I think it's interesting that they make all these allegations about the dirty bombs and other items she supposedly had, but they haven't charged her with anything relating to terrorism... I would urge people to consider her as innocent unless the government proves otherwise.
It is important to note her lawyer’s remark. After Dr. Aafia’s case was filed, she could have been bailed according to US law, but such was the terrible role of Ambassador Haqqani in the United States he forbade her lawyer to make a bail plea for her and ultimately the lawyer was forced to resign. On the other hand, the traitor Haqqani gave false hopes to the family of Dr. Aafia.
In August 2009, Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani met with Siddiqui's sister at his residence, and assured her that Pakistan would seek Siddiqui's release from the US. The Pakistani government on the behest of Haqqani paid $2 million for the services of a three-person defence team to supplement her two existing public defenders to assist in the defense of Siddiqui during her trial.
In fact, the government of Pakistan and Foreign Ministry was never serious about bringing Aafia Siddiqui back. But to avoid public backlash arising due to the immense courage and persistence of Dr. Aafia they remained limited to the extent of press statements.
American journalist and attorney Tina Foster addressing a seminar in Regent Plaza during her visit to Karachi on 6 March 2010 said that Pakistan received the services of lawyers not to get Aafia released but to convict her. Tina Foster said there was no legal basis for the case and that the charges against Dr. Aafia could have been easily proven wrong.
Siddiqui refused to co-operate with them. She tried to dismiss her lawyers because they were Jewish. She said the case against her was a Jewish conspiracy, and demanded that no Jews be allowed on the jury. She demanded that all prospective jurors be DNA-tested, and excluded from the jury at her trial "if they have a Zionist or Israeli background ... they are all mad at me ... I have a feeling everyone here is them—subject to genetic testing, they should be excluded, if you want to be fair."
Dr. Aafia demanded that if her physical search, by stripping her clothes off be stopped she is ready to come to the court but the US government lawyer and defence lawyer didn’t do anything about it. US Attorney Don Cardy said the treatment vetted out to Aafia was the Standard Operation Procedure. Oppressed sister Aafia Siddiqui also demanded that if the US government blames her for a criminal then instead of this terrible treatment they should grant her death sentence but not this humiliation because for a Muslim woman desecration is worse than the death penalty.
The defence lawyers acted as coordinators for US government lawyers. Ironically, Pakistani government kept reminding Aafia's family that they were giving them a favour by spending so much money on her lawyers. No question that these lawyers were hired to condemn Aafia to 86 years.
British Muslim journalist Ms. Maryum Yvonne Ridley during her visit to Karachi on March 19, 2010 in her press conference also informed that on behalf of the Britan House of Lord, she and Lord Nazir came to America to discuss about the issue of Dr. Aafia and were deeply shocked and saddened to know that, the Pakistani Foreign Ministry did not ask US State Department for Dr. Aafia's release at any government level.
Maryum Ridley also said that Pakistani Government of that time who have surrendered to the American FBI, hundreds of women and children, they fear Aafia’s release because she after knowing all about this so-called war on terrorism had become an eye-witness. Richard Holbrooke at the time of his visit to Pakistan also accepted that the Pakistani government never demanded the repatriation of Dr. Aafia Siddiqui.
Prior to her trial, Siddiqui said she was innocent of all charges. She maintained she could prove she was innocent, but refused to do so in court.
On 11 January 2010, Siddiqui told the Judge that she would not co-operate with her attorneys, and wanted to fire them. She said she did not trust the Judge, and added, "I'm boycotting the trial, just to let all of you know. There's too many injustices." She then put her head down on the defence table as the prosecution proceeded.
Nine government witnesses were called by the prosecution: Army Captain Robert Snyder, John Threadcraft, a former army officer, and FBI agent John Jefferson testified first. As Snyder testified that Siddiqui had been arrested with a handwritten note outlining plans to attack various US sites, she interjected: "Since I'll never get a chance to speak... If you were in a secret prison... or your children were tortured... Give me a little credit, this is not a list of targets against New York. I was never planning to bomb it. You're lying." The court also heard from FBI agent John Jefferson and Ahmed Gul, an army interpreter, who recounted their struggle with her. The judge disallowed as evidence her possession of chemicals and terror manuals and her alleged ties to al-Qaeda because they could have created an inappropriate bias.
The defence said there was no forensic evidence that the rifle was fired in the interrogation room. They noted the nine government witnesses offered conflicting accounts of how many people were in the room, where they were positioned and how many shots were fired. It said that her handbag contents were not credible as evidence because they were sloppily handled. According to the Associated Press of Pakistan, Carlo Rosati, an FBI firearms expert witness in the federal court doubted whether the M-4 rifle was ever fired at the crime scene; an FBI agent testified that Siddiqui's fingerprints were not found on the rifle.
When Siddiqui testified, she admitted trying to escape, She said she had been "tortured in secret prisons"
During the trial, Siddiqui was removed from the court several times for repeatedly interrupting the proceedings with shouting; on being ejected, she was told by the judge that she could watch the proceedings on closed-circuit television in an adjacent holding cell. A request by the defence lawyers to declare a mistrial was turned down by the judge
After jurors found Siddiqui guilty, she exclaimed: "This is a verdict coming from Israel, not America. That's where the anger belongs.
Siddiqui was sentenced to 86 years in prison by the federal judge Berman in Manhattan on 23 September 2010.
At the time of the sentencing, Siddiqui did not show any interest in filing an appeal when asked she said, "I appeal to God and he hears me."
Siddiqui (Federal Bureau of Prisons #90279-054) was originally held at Metropolitan Detention Center, Brooklyn. She is now being held in Federal Medical Center, Carswell in Fort Worth, Texas, a federal prison for female inmates with special mental health needs. Her release date is August 30, 2083.
Afghan authorities handed Aafia Siddiqui’s son, Muhammad Ahmad, over to Pakistan in September 2008. In April 2010, Aafia Siddiqui’s daughter, Mariam, was found outside the family house wearing a collar with the address of the family home. She was said to be speaking English.
In June 2013 she was attacked in Federal Medical Center, Carswell in Fort Worth, Texas, she remained unconscious for two days, at last after the efforts of a lawyer she was granted medical aid.
Whenever her mother got her on phone Aafia gave courage to her mother, and told her that she was alright and not worried, she also said that she was honoured by having seen the Holy Prophet often in her dream and he comes along with Mother Ayesha and they have made her their daughter. She also said that once I asked the Holy Prophet (PBUH) when my trials would be over. He said this is not your trial this is my Ummah’s test.
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