Saudis Allege Torture in Guantanamo Deaths

In this April 6, 2006 file photo, reviewed by U.S. military officials, a detainee walks and others sit, as a guard looks on standing next to a hut, within the fenced in grounds of the maximum security prison at Camp Delta, at the Guantanamo Bay U.S. Naval Base, Cuba. (Brennan Linsley - AP)

"They were killed; they were murdered. This was no suicide," said Lulua al Dakheel, whose son, 22-year-old Fahed al Fouzan, has been at Guantanamo for more than four years.

Speaking through tears, she added: "There are no guarantees that my son won't be next. These people (U.S. officials) can't be trusted. They treat their dogs better than they treat our sons."

Some people in the conservative Islamic kingdom questioned whether Muslim men would kill themselves since suicide is a grave sin in Islam. But defense lawyers and some former detainees said many prisoners at Guantanamo are wasting away in deep despair at their long captivity.

The U.S. military said the bodies of the two Saudis and one Yemeni were found in their cells, hanging from sheets and clothing. Officials said all three left suicide notes.

According to U.S. military officials, the dead men had previously engaged in a hunger strike to protest their indefinite incarceration and had been force-fed before quitting their protest.

One of the detainees was accused by U.S. officials of being a mid- or high-level al-Qaida operative, while another was captured in Afghanistan and participated in a riot at a prison there, said the jail's commander, Navy Rear Adm. Harry Harris. The third belonged to a splinter group, he said.

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Associated Press writer Lara Sukhtian in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, contributed to this report.