Feroz Abbasi disliked the brash Australian who competed with him for the attention and favor of their al-Qaeda boss. He described his rival as "Al-Qaedah's 24 ct. [carat] Golden Boy" and claimed he'd said he wanted to rob and kill Jews back in Australia and crash an airplane into a building. Abbasi's resentful and deeply unflattering account of his Australian comrade, David Hicks, is contained in a 148-page memoir he wrote for anti-terrorism investigators while incarcerated in the U.S. military prison at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba.
In a signed statement made on Oct. 20, 2004, and seen by Time, Abbasi repudiated all the claims made in the hand-written document and described the allegations against Hicks as "ludicrous in their content (yet believed by dense interrogators)." But Time has learned that Abbasi's memoir of the prisoner he repeatedly refers to as "Golden Boy" may have been used by those interrogators to build a case against the Australian terror suspect, who has been in Guantánamo Bay since 2001. Hicks' lawyers have also questioned the veracity of the document's content. Hicks' name, like most others in the document, has been inked out by censors.
The memoir, obtained by Time last week, contains detailed recollections of "David Matthew Hicks," who Abbasi says trained in Afghanistan in the same al-Qaeda camps as Abbasi and failed British shoe bomber Richard Reid. Abbasi says he first met Hicks during a fitness exercise that involved jogging around their Al Farooq training camp near Kandahar, in southern Afghanistan. He writes that Hicks was teamed in the camp with Filipino recruits from the Moro Islamic Liberation Front.
Abbasi explains that he christened the Australian "Al Qaedah's 24 ct. Golden Boy" because he was so obviously the favorite recruit. Golden Boy, he writes, was often seen sitting and having long conversations about Kashmir with their al-Qaeda trainer. Abbasi does not hide his resentment of Hicks, writing that he was allowed to break rules during training and never received the standard punishment of doing push-ups. "We had to stand next to a shooter and catch his bullet shells as they were ejected from the rifle before they hit the ground. Golden Boy Hicks thought it was childish and stupid and absolutely refused. All that happened was he was told to go back to [our accommodation]. Golden Boy was probably thinking of 'pulling the pin' as he would always say until Golden Boy and Hudaifah had a nice little chat and patched things up. Whereas if everybody else did that they would be thrown off the course (like some Turkistanis were if I remember rightly). Yep. That little runt David Matthew Hicks Al-Qaedah's 24 ct. Golden Boy."
Abbasi's rivalry with the Australian appears to have been exploited by his Federal Bureau of Investigation interrogators in Gauntánamo. In a section headed "Final Chapter Golden Boy," Abbasi writes that the f.b.i. is studying tapes of Golden Boy, who he says wanted to "go back to Australia and rob and kill Jews," crash a plane into a building, and "go out with that last big adrenalin rush." He also says Hicks would pose a threat if released. "He once told me in Afghanistan that if he were to go into a building of Jews with an automatic weapon or as a suicide bomber he would have to say something like 'there is no god but Allah' ect [sic] just so he could see the look of fear on their faces, before he takes them out," writes Abbasi.
Abbasi writes that when they were together in Guantánamo's Camp X-Ray, Hicks told him he was praying to Satan for help. The appraisal finishes with a warning about Hicks: "Release him and see. If I know Golden Boy Hicks, I know that he has to have that last big adrenalin rush even if it takes him out." Abbasi also vents ill-feeling toward the Australian in his conclusion, where he suggests that Hicks is cooperating with the Americans. "As long as I do not dance to your tune like Golden Boy … and tell you what you want to hear, you will always strive to condemn me. In fact you have already done as much," he writes.
Abbasi was arrested in Afghanistan in 2001 after being caught carrying a grenade in his underpants. His U.K.-based lawyer, Louise Christian, declined to comment on the memoir. She said Abbasi has not given any media interviews about his internment. U.S. Military Judge Susan Crawford is currently considering whether to recommend that Hicks face charges of attempted murder and providing support for terrorism. If the charges are laid, they would be heard by a U.S. Military Commission. Says Hicks' U.S.-appointed defender, military lawyer Major Michael Mori, of Abbasi's memoir: "It's easy to make allegations, but I want to see the person in court and subject to cross-examination."
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