Usman Yusuf, planted evidence Just two days after his return, following seven years of imprisonment in Bagram, Usman was once again forced from his home and out of a life he had just returned to. The Pakistan army had begun an offensive in the area (see page 11): “I belong to Waziristan. When I returned from there [Afghanistan], there was also a war in my country. Then I migrated from my village to Swabi as an IDP (internally displaced person). There are no family, relatives and friends of mine here … we are so helpless.” I want to say to the Americans, ‘your government’s decision is wrong’. I want to say to the people of America that they should come forward and stop their government from doing wrong. Wherever they are fighting, they are wrong. This is cruelty; whatever they did to me was a sin. Usman recalled how he came to be acquainted with the Tablighi Jamaat, an Islamic proselytizing movement,41 through which he came to cross the border into Afghanistan, leading to his capture by American forces. He was working in a small town in Pakistan’s Punjab province in 2006 and then moved to the northern city of Peshawar. “I think it was in 2007… no, actually it was 2011.” Despite an inability to track a broad, orderly timeline, Usman remembered its details: I was working at a CNG pump; then I started work at a hotel. After leaving the hotel, I moved back to my hometown. Here I met some people from the Tablighi Jamaat who asked me to come with them. I liked their invitation, and so I told them ‘I want to go with you; tabligh is a noble way of life.’ They told me that their leader would guide me and send me with a team. He [the spiritual leader] said, ‘You will go to Afghanistan and you will preach there. When your tabligh is complete you will come back. On your return you will preach in your own country or another.’ In October 2011, Usman and 10 other male missionaries travelled to Afghanistan. They were on their way to a mosque in Shakeen. He recalled travelling alone in a car with a driver who he identified as Afghan, while the others followed in a bus. Because of limited space, Usman explained, the other nine individuals were unable to share the car with him. He estimated they had been travelling for about an hour when they were apprehended at a checkpoint by US authorities who demanded to know where they were going. “There were US troops standing in the way and they ordered us to stop the vehicle … They asked us why we were there, so we told them that we were there for tabligh. Usman said he was singled out and asked why he had such a long beard, to which he replied, “Every bearded man is not a mujahid. We also have beards in tabligh.”  Shireen Khan Burki. “The Tablighi Jama’at: Proselytizing Missionaries or Trojan Horse?” Journal of Applied Security Research. 8:1. 2013. 41 28