Saudi Detainee at Guantanamo Reportedly Kills Self

May 31, 07:39 AM

Current Headlines: By MICHAEL MELIA

By MICHAEL MELIA

The Associated Press

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - A Saudi Arabian detainee died Wednesday at Guantanamo Bay prison and the U.S. military said he apparently committed suicide.

Guards at the U.S. naval base in southeast Cuba found the detainee in his cell unresponsive and not breathing Wednesday afternoon, the U.S. military's Southern Command said in a statement.

"They tried to save his life, but he was pronounced dead," said Mario Alvarez, a Miami-based spokesman for the command.

It would be the fourth suicide at Guantanamo since the prison camp opened in January 2002. On June 10, 2006, two Saudi detainees and one Yemeni hanged themselves with sheets. Details, including the prisoner's name and manner of death, were not released.

A spokesman for detention operations, Navy Cmdr. Rick Haupt, declined to comment, referring questions to the Miami-based Southern Command, which oversees U.S. military operations in the Caribbean and Latin America.

The death came as the U.S. military prepared to try two detainees - Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a Yemeni, and Omar Khadr, a Canadian who was 15 when he was captured in a firefight with U.S. troops in Afghanistan. Their arraignment is scheduled to proceed Monday at Guantanamo as planned, Navy Cmdr. Jeffrey Gordon, a Pentagon spokesman, said late Wednesday.

About 380 men are held at the isolated prison camp on suspicion of links to al-Qaida or the Taliban.

The Naval Criminal Investigative Service is conducting an ongoing investigation into the three previous suicides.

The military toughened security at the prison camp after the previous suicides and an uprising in the spring, taking measures to remove access to light fixtures and other possible makeshift weapons.

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