Aafia Siddiqui, a Pakistani neuroscientist had gone through a serious violent assault by an inmate at the Federal Medical Center, Carswell in Fort Worth, Texas. She asked for public support after the incident.
CAGE, a US-based NGO, received reports on July 30 2021, from Marwa Elbially, the lawyer of Aafia that her fellow inmate attacked Aafia Siddiqui in her cell and he had been harassing her for some time. He also smashed a blistering hot liquid-filled coffee mug into her face, the lawyer informed.
Dr Aafia Siddiqui in shock and agonizing pain curled into a fetal position. She was taken out by wheelchair from the cell as she was unable to get up after the assault. From an unquantified period, Dr Siddiqui has been placed in administrative solitary incarceration.
Dr Aafia is also known as the “grey lady of Bagram”. In 2010 in a controversial trial during which she was sentenced to 86 years of confinement for attempted murder.
Dr Aafia’s case has been plagued by unpredictabilities, antithetical affirmations and confirmations gathered from torture to the point she has been called “the most wronged woman in the world”. After several years of silence from her and from the US authorities, the public and her family questioned whether she was still alive or not. Her lawyer met Dr Siddiqui in January 2021. Marwa Elbially told CAGE that during her visit to Dr Siddiqui, she was astounded to see clear burns around her eyes, a blister of 3 inches near her left eye. She also saw a wound on her right cheek that was covered in toothpaste and also bruises on her right arm and legs. Dr. Aafia said to her lawyer that it is a miracle of Allah that she is not blind yet.
“Ridley” a journalist who uncovered the story of Aafia said that it is injustice. Moazzam Begg, CAGE Outreach Director, said that in the abject history of the “war on terror” the case of Aafia Siddiqui remains one of the most difficult cases.
He further said that we should ask Pakistani authorities if they will be after her repatriation while she is alive or when she will be inside a body bag. He said that it’s time to close this chapter. She needs to go home and she needs to be with the children she never saw growing up.