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October 10 2009:
Fia and her family are on their way home
- But we will not go to any of the known addresses of the media - although there are some who see the addresses and the police to report any disturbances.
August 28 to October 10, 2009
Fia and Benjamin are imprisoned in Pakistan
I sat on the train on the way home when the phone rang: "Hello, I am a journalist at xjournal(can not remember which magazine) and would like to ask you about your daughter who is imprisoned in Pakistan?" - Huh ?!?!? What do you say, man? She is on the area, "I said, in Saudi Arabia. She called several times from there. And Maile. And sent sms.
That was how it began, for me, September the 11. It banged on the door until 12 at night. Journalists. I reported this to the police. I could not go out the days that followed.
Since then my life i a chaos. Again! And for a few days ago I received a threatening letter in which they did not think I should not write anymore on this site. I had no intention to write something, at least not before I have the facts and nothing concrete to write about. I do not want to speculate. But since I am threatened if I continue to write on this site so I have to continue to write! I have never wanted to do what these racist extremists want, so have them to thank for that I start writing and publishing this now - before I have all the facts at hand. But I do not write about things I do not know for sure. This is rather the habit of the journalists.
I will eventually show and link to both friendly and hateful writings against Fia - and me. Insane theories. Wild guesses. Weird articles about her teenage past. About how her father died. I correct gradually and confirm what is true and reject what is not true in the data. I have not wanted to talk to media about her life story or anything that does not feel substantial, not now. I have no time for idle talk now. I only have time to try to find someone or something that could help Fia and Benjamin to come home.
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To My Daughter 2007, March
This webpage is dedicated to my 17-year-old daughter Safia (Fia, as the family calls her) who was kidnapped and inprisoned in january 2007 when visiting Somalia during her christmas-holidays trip to Dubai and the other Gulf States. I could not to talk to her since december 2006 till she came back on 28 March 2007. I missed her a lot and I was struggling to get her and her expected baby - and fiancee - back home.
This homepage is the very first I am constructing - and I am doing it for you Fia, I might not be so good at this but I want to do this myself because I want to write to you and about you. I want to tell the world about you. Maybe one day you will be free and able to read this. I want you to know that I was fighting for you. That I was thinking about you. Every single day. That every day I tried to do something to get you back home.
If you die, I will find everybody who has hurt you. It might take time - but I have the patience of a mother and a grandmother and I will never forget you, Fia. I will unveil everyone who ignored you and your baby when I tried to make them help you and I will reveal all their names here on your homepage. I will disclose them in every way that I can. But I will also tell about those who helped me, supported me and did what they could to help you to come home again to me, to your mummy.
17 june 07, Insult after Insult
Reading in newspapers what I should have been told about by Foreign Ministry for five months ago. They called me on friday night by 6 pm and told me I could come and read the journals about Fia. I had asked about it for almost four months ago. I said it was too late for tonight was it not? They said i could come next week some day.
Wellplanned. Perfectly timed. So I could get more upset during the weekend. And read in media how deep the insult was. How the Foreign Ministry lied to me allover, right into my face.
Yes, they may seem to have been trying to get her home. And meanwhile treating me as i was their fool with no rights. My daughters tormentors in Ethiopia, Somalia and Kenya - including all the western intelligencies - were disregarding her humanity. The same way were there authorities whose employer I - together with all other swedes -índeed am, disregarding me as a human and a mother of a minor in danger.
They say the situation was delicate and they wanted to show recpect to the detained. Delicate for whom? And should/could you show respect to the detainees by keeping quiet about their whereabouts even to their families? While knowing where they were and who were tormenting them. This could only have been delicate to those who were committing crimes! It is them that the Foreign Ministry respected! Its them the Foreign Department protected so they could go on torturing and playing with human life and health. The detained wanted it all to be known! The message from Monir when he succeeded to call me on february the 1 from Mogadishu was clear: Tell about us! Talk to Foreign Ministry and then to media! Certainly everyone wants to have a privacy in his life - and not to be in focus for media - if possible. But when serious crimes against the humanrights are committed the victims want it to be known and admitted! Not that the authorities of their home-country turn a blind eye to that their nationals are tortured!
I talked first to Foreign Ministry. And the swedish embassies in Ethiopia and Kenya. Foreign Ministry said they did not know anything about anything at all. The embassys said they did not talk to the families of swedes who were abroad. Not even if there was a sole alone swedish minor abroad and in trouble. I contacted the ethiopian embassy in Stockholm - they never answered the email and they never called back - and prefered to not be available when I called. I wrote to Carl Bildt - who never answered. I talked to Red Cross who told me they could put them on a list of missing people. I got an appointment with Helsinkicommissionary - who dropped off from the meeting. I talked to Humanrights Commissionary who asked if I wanted to sue the Kingdom of Sweden. The Amnesty, who said they dont help individuals. And others. Many others. Then I made this webpaige. To tell what they - those who committed crimes against her - and those who just did not want to do anything - did to my young daughter.
I wish the Foreign Ministry had shown respect to us, the families of the detained. Gathered us and informed us. Let us give support to eachother. We had to find eachother ourselves. We tried ourselves to put together what ever information we had. Foreign Ministry wanted us to remain as ignorant as possible of the situation. While they knew all the time what was happening to them. I can still not see how it could have worsened the situation of the detainees if the Foreign Ministry had told us they knew where they were. Everybody was supposing they were in Ethiopia anyway! Finally we found out that one of the detained had even called home - from Ethiopia. That we should be treated this way was just a sick degradation game the Foreign Ministry was playing with us. The only result a normal and a little more openhearted tratment from Foreign Ministry could have had was that we could have still be trusting the Foreign Ministry. Why were we less worthy than the families of those swedes who were stroken by the tsunami in Thailand?
We must not forget that the most horrifying thing is ofcourse that the silence of the Foreign Ministry made the torture of the swedish citizens easier. The silence was an OK to torture. The danish did not say ok. They said give us our nationals. And they came home quick. Ten brits did not say ok. They said give us our nationals. And they came home quick. But the swedes were sitting backbound in the cages. Questioned and battered from morning till evening.
Why were our detained relatives, who were victims, less worthy as humans than the swedish woman in Australia who had confessed she had killed two people - and the same day offered all diplomatic assistance from Sweden, and a lawyer! Is the answer simply that we are muslims? Helena Benaouda
2007-06-09 All swedes we knew of are free
All with any swedish connection who were at the concentrationscamp of Janmeida in Addis Abeba are free now. Even the last ones, two young women and three children, who were in the end of May deported back from Addis Abeba to Mogadishu, and spend some time in detention at the Mogadishu airport, were released in the begining of June.
But the war and warcrimes in Somalia - and in Ethiopia - continues. Against their own people. While we in west look away. But Release my child will continue reporting about illegal renditions. Specially cases of rendered children. It will be the legacy of Fia.
2007-06-02 Swedish national killed in Somalia?
There has come out some informations about a swede who may have been killed in Somalia. There is no real facts about it so far, and no part in this war can be considered to give neutral and correct information and no body knows - or tells - who this swede was. Therefore its better to not speculate too much. But one should - as a clear fact - remember that the american stole many passports - so also Fias and Monirs passports! They promissed to give them back but so did not happen So we use the word "stole" and ask with emphasis: Why do the american keep the passports? Why do the ethiopian leave all the passports to the american? Is Ethiopia a country that cant take care of passports and leave them back to the owner - or in case of death to the embassy of the deceased? Next thougt is, consequently, does this american stubborness to keep the passport have something to do with that the american may need the passports of the captured to plant them here and there - where they think it would look good? Or rather bad for the owners of the passports...
Logicly: the passports may belong to a dead person, or a captured person in a secret prison, or to a person who is already at home - in his own country! Besides: there are persons who steal passorts of other people to be able to show up them in case they need another identity - because it could be easier to look for protection with a swedish passport in your hand specially in a situation as the one in Somalia. So its not even sure the dead body you find is the owner of the passport he has in his pocket. I hope the swedish authorities are quiet about this for the right reason: because they thought about these things - and want to be sure who the dead person was.
2007-05-28 Prisoners with swedish connection deported to continued detention in Mogadishu
Horrifying news from Ethiopia of batterings, torture and sexual harrashments have reached us. The wife of the swedish Osman was deported together with her sister and their , in all 3 children to Mogadishu. They sit in the same place where they used to be, at Mogadishu airport. With them there is one more woman and her 4 children and one male prisoner also deperted from Addis Abeba to Mogadishu, all together. Before the deportation one of these women was agout to be raped by an ethiopian soldier, but one of the prisoners came to protect her, whereby he was severally beaten up and taken away. No one knows if he is dead or alive.
2007-05-26 "Ethiopian swedes" talk in media
"Ethiopian swedes" talk in swedish media SVD and i Konflikt.
2007-05-23 A lot to do
The swedes have a lot to do. Visiting doctors, reporting stolen passports and id-cards. By the american or in one case kenyan. They want to get some sort of an appologizes, from somewhere, so they met their lawyer to discuss this. But its complicated because so many states and so many diffent interests are involved. Many committed crimes against international laws and human rights. The only evident is that they are not suspected. Also: there was no final trial. No judgement. They were taken to the airport - with guns pointed at them to stress and harrash them and make them think they would be kidnapped again. to some other US sponsored secret prison. Then they were flewn home. Monir is tired - he falls asleep as soon as he sits down and nobody is talking to him to keep him awake. He tells. But the thoughts jump a lot. He confirms all that Fia has told. And completes with details of the torture and batterings. His injuries. that Fia told about, were photographed by swedsh authorities. The lawyer takes care of media right now.
2007-05-19 Swedes are free
A schocking phonecall tells the swedes just arrived in Stockholm. Both they and their families are dazed. Today is only for family and hugs. No media.
2007-05-09 Ethiopia refuses to let the swedes go - saying the Sweish protest sounds like a commandmend...
Fia is frustrated: "They are just trynig to prolong it. Maybe they have marks of the torture and that takes time to heal? There is plenty of proof against the Ethiopian as comes to crimes of war and against USA and others what comes to crimes as the torture of prisoners - and they know that have to let them go one day. There is no proof - none of us was doing anything but trying to flee from war and bombs - and the secret services were not even interested in what we did in Somalia! They knew we did nothing and they told us they knew that! But all this this their made-believe show is just as stupid as the ass-idiotic questions of "why did we want to flee from a war!" You get only more and more disgusted by these humanrights-ignoring dictators and their willing profiteurs and war-fetischistic, pretending-to-be-democratic- western presidents and primeministers."
The Cageprisoners report recommends the Swedish government to be sure the swedes that are still kept detained get all the diplomatic assistance and that the wife and children of Osman who are detained also will be processed to swedish citizenship.The swedes have now visits from the embassy. Monir did receive a letter that Fia wrote to him. And Fia received a picture taken by the embassy. The picture is taken in the building where Fia met embassy and where he "gave back" to the abusive ethiopian soldier. (Read above) This means that the embassy has still not get access to the prison itself. We are not getting any info just that they are ok - after the circumstances. And they had been for the first time allowed to speak swedish with the embassy staff.
Fia called embassy. They refer to the lawyer. And the lawyer gets no info.
2007-04-21 FIA is waiting
The waiting is long and its hard to not to be able to plan the future. Many practical things have to be done. Read here about Fias daily-waiting and comments on media and something about how she fled and her time in prison >>
2007-03-28 - 2007-04-20 Fia is back!
But her thoughts are still in Ethiopia - with those who are left back. Read more > |
Three questions for those who believed on the allegation that she wants to be imprisoned in Pakistan:
1 Does it sound like something clever?
2 Do you wish to sit in jail? In Pakistan,?
3, May you be in prison - just because you want to? Go to any jail and ask if you may!
NOTICE: FIA never got an offer to go home from Pakistan!
Yet it was written about her as a fanatical lunatic / insane and submissive woman / manipulative person / bad mother as she did not come home with her child. Fair?
Speculation about airline tickets
Yes, it is me who paid Fia´s and Benjamin's ticket home. On October the 8, immediately after I heard that I could do so. Money was from my salary from my work. Not from any Muslim organization. I take no salary and no salary at all from any Muslim organization, and I have never done so. For me it is an honor to produce, not to consume.
No, I was never asked to buy her ticket home from Ethiopia. Neither by the state or by her. She said that she had received a bill and she said that she would arrange it herself for it was not I who had seen to that she got there ... She moved from home in 2007 and I have not had a review over her finances since then.
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My daughter Fia came home on March the 28th 07
The other swedes came home on May the 19th 07. All of them witness about torture and ill-treatment. None of them was accused in a legal court - and ofcourse not convicted.
I thank all those nice people who helped me. Fia sends her special thanks to Kristina, the wife of the embassador of Sweden in Ethiopia.
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"It was like a concentra-tioncamp and I felt like I was Anne Frank when I wrote my diary on toiletpaper." Fia
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All swedes we knew of are free
But the war and warcrimes in Somalia - and in Ethiopia - continues. Against their own people. While we in west look away. Release my child will continue reporting about illegal renditions. Specially cases of rendered children. It will be the legacy of Fia. ____________________
11 Children were sent to a concentration-camp!
The 23 of March i finally got the confirmation over the fact that my 17- year old daughter was with the group of people who were sent from Nairobi to Mogadishu to imprisonment in secret incommunicadodetention. She is together with 11 other minors and 11 women. The youngest detainee, a daughter to a swedish father and somalian mother is a 7 months old baby-girl. 7 of the women were pregnant, one of them will probably give birth any day by now.
I got this confirmation through the organisation called Cageprisoners.
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"Please, where is Safia, my 17-year old daughter?"
I sent this sms almost daily to the phonenumber 00252 60757052, that i managed to get when someone called me from Mogadishu the 5 february. It was my last clue after my child untill the 23 of march, when I found her name in the Reprieve and Gagepriseoners report as above.
I gave the phone nr to Foreign Ministry - they said i "needed not worry - they would not check the number..."
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Answer to a usual question by e-mail:
Was she accused for something?
No, there never was any kind of accuses against her at all during all the time she was detained. "But still they told me I had no rights at all" she says.
We read all e-mails and try to answer as many as possible, but we have to appology for not yet being able to answer all of you.
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About why she went to Somalia at all, she says that they would not have gone if she had known the situation of Somalia better.
But then she says in her totally annoying and mother-maddening teenager way: ”But i cant get it! Why would I not be free to go anywhere I want to in the world!!!! I just cant get it!!!!!! Even if Somalia was a disaster, it cant be CRIMINAL to go to Somalia! What on earth does anyone have to do with where I travel to?????
Umm…..… well…yea… ok…you maybe … mum…” Comes then a little more agreeably…
She did not tell me she was going to Somalia. She knew that I would not accept it. I had not even accepted the Dubai-vacation wholeheartedly, though she talked a lot about wanting to travel to Dubai during the christmas-vacations.
When they left Sweden it was still peacefull in Somalia and they did not get any news about that it was getting worse. They did not follow the media after they left Sweden.
But I do understand her point. Why would it be considered to be almost as criminal to go to some countries? And if it coud be criminal so why were not the american businessmen captured and put in jail when they arrived to Somalia to write oil-contracts a few days after the bombings and overtake of Mogadishu?
Think aboiut that. i dont think yuu will find an answer that your pure heart will fully accept... not if you think all humanbeings have equal rights.
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Taking the 'War on Terror' to Africa
Spiegel on Line 13 june 2007: Last week, European investigators slammed the US for its handling of terror suspects. But little seems to have changed. Now, the CIA has set up shop on the Horn of Africa.
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