Some 16 families were able to talk to their relatives at the prison camp for an hour each via a video link.
Ahmad Al-Qahtani and his family were able to talk to his brother, a detainee for 10 years at Guantanamo Bay, thanks to the initiative from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and Saudi Red Crescent (SRC).
“He looked so sad and depressed and he was trying to stop himself from crying,” said Al-Qahtani.
“Ten years of sadness which my mother has had to weather, as well as missing him,” he said, adding that his brother was 25-year-old when he was captured and still has not been released or put on trial.
Al-Qahtani claims that his brother’s name was among those considered not guilty by the White House, although he is still in captivity.
“We were informed that he was tortured into giving a false confession,” he said, adding that the family was hoping that he would have been released with other prisoners already.
The Saudi Red Crescent (SRC) was able to facilitate 12 video calls as well as 66 telephone calls between detainees and their families. The SRC also facilitated the first telephone call between detainees in Afghanistan and their families in the Kingdom in June 2010 and is working on facilitating visits to detainees in Iraq.
