University welcomes former Guantanamo detainee to meet with law students
Former Guantanamo detainee Mohamedou Ould Slahi was welcomed to meet with law students at the University of Brighton.
On 28 April 2023, over 100 students and guests attended an event organised by law lecturer Sara Birch and two second year law students, Hannah Klein and Lottie Newcombe (members of the Brighton University Amnesty Society) in Huxley lecture theatre.
The organisers were grateful to the Belong at Brighton Extra Fund for providing the funding for the event which included a screening of the film ‘The Mauritanian,’ depicting former Guantanamo detainee Mohamedou Ould Slahi’s 14-year detention without charge or trial in Guantanamo.
The film screening was followed by a Q&A session with Mohamedou Ould Slahi, Andy Worthington (a renowned expert on issues relating to Guantanamo) and Steve Wood (who had previously been one of Mohamedou’s guards whilst in detention).
Mohamedou Ould Slahi was in the UK to attend the launch of a new All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG), calling for the closure of the Guantanamo Detention Facility in Parliament. Sara Birch is the convenor of the UK Guantanamo Network which has been working with parliamentarians over the past year to set up a new APPG to call for the closure of a facility which the United Nations has referred to as “a stain on the stated commitment of the United States to the rule of law”.
Helena Kennedy QC who has stepped forward to be an Officer of the new APPG welcomed Mohamedou Ould Slahi to the UK before he travelled down to the University to meet our students.
Earlier this year, Mohamedou Ould Slahi also took part in an on-line teaching session with Masters students who are currently enrolled on our LLM course on International Human Rights and Social Justice. He took part in an hour long meeting with the students from his home in the Netherlands to discuss issues relating the rule of law and illegal detention from a personal perspective. During the meeting, our students were given a virtual tour of the former house of Anne Frank and her family where Mohamedou currently lives. Every year the Dutch Foundation for Literature invites a new ‘refugee writer’ to live there and take care of the house for one year.
The University of Brighton hosted an international conference to mark the 20th anniversary of the opening of Guantanamo in November 2021. Papers presented and recordings can be found here: https://blogs.brighton.ac.uk/guantanamo20yearsafter/.