Former Guantanamo Detainee Returns to Work at Al Jazeera

Sami al-Hajj was stopped by Pakastani forces on the border of Afghanistan in 2001. The New York Times reports that the U.S. military accused him of falsifying documents and delivering money to Chechen rebels, and held him for the next seven years without a charge. The nearly 800 detainees to end up at Guantanamo Bay had similar stories, but there was one thing unique about Hajj: he was the only known prisoner to be a journalist.

Now, a year after the end of his seven-year captivity, Hajj is back at work with his old organization, the Arabic satellite news agency Al Jazeera. Before his capture he had been a photojournalist; now Hajj is a correspondent. He did a six-part series on his imprisonment after he was released -- coveted programming for a network that has been a platform for Arab outrage about the U.S. military's treatment of detainees during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Ahmed Sheikh, Al Jazeera's editor in chief, described Hajj as "one of the victims of the human rights atrocities committed by the ex-U.S. administration."

The 40-year-old Hajj said that his time at Guantanamo -- not to mention growing up in war-torn Sudan -- has not radicalized him. Even though he believes he was taken by mistake and held unjustly, he still holds to a strong belief in democracy and the rule of law. He has expanded his coverage to champion press freedom in Iraq and the implications of the USA Patriot Act.

Hajj says the emotional torture of Guantanamo was worse than the physical discomfort, and that he continues to see psychotherapists. He has founded the Guantanamo Justice Center, a group for former detainees that is preparing legal action against the Bush administration.