CIA's Ethiopia "Guantanamo"

Nageh, 27, had fought alongside the Islamic Courts in its battles to seize control of law-less Somalia.

When Ethiopian and interim government troops unleashed a massive military operation against the by then ruling Court, he was told, like fellow former foreign fighters, to leave the country.

"We moved to the southern port city of Kismayo, accompanied by our wives," Nageh told IslamOnline.net in the Egyptian capital after his eventual release.

He and his pregnant wife flew from the capital Mogadishu to Kismayo, 500 kilometers south, where they reunited with fellow former foreign fighters.

They were to flee across the borders to Kenya but bombardment of Islamic Courts positions intensified, forcing them to fan out.

"We were taken aback on the second day of `Eid Al-Adha by massive American and Ethiopian bombing," Nageh remembered.

"We all went our separate ways into the woods and bushes," he said, recalling the death of a friend in the shelling.

"I kissed his forefront," he said. "We didn't even have a chance to bury him because the Ethiopians were bombarding the borders like crazy."

Rendition

Those who survived the shelling thrust into the unknown at the Kenyan bushes, where predators and crocodiles were making the majority of the areas' fauna.

"I was moving with two Syrians, two Tunisians and an American," he recalled.

"We spent 19 days in the no-man swamps."

Then came the false hope of survival after the group accidently ran into two Kenyan coalminers who provided them with food and assistance before selling them out to the authorities.

"Kenyan forces stripped us to underwear and took us to checkpoint then to the capital Nairobi," said Nageh.

"After long hours of interrogation, we were thrown into a plane that took us to Baidoa," he added, referring to the southern Somali town that was headquarters of the interim government.

"We were crammed into a stinking underground tunnel for days before again being flown to what we later discovered to have been Addis Ababa."

The Independent had revealed the existence of CIA secret prisons in Ethiopia to interrogate terror suspects.

It said dozens of Somali refugees, including children and women, were flown on CIA rendition flights from Kenya for interrogation in Addis Ababa.

Guantanamo

Nageh said he was interrogated in a secret detention center in the Ethiopian capital by CIA officers for 45 days.

"I was bundled into a truck handcuffed and blindfolded to find myself later in a big hall with armchairs and a sofa."

At the factory-like secret detention center, nine interrogators grilled him for hours.

"The chief interrogator, speaking in English with unmistaken American accent, used to shout 'liar' in my ears every time I answered a question," Nageh said.

He added that at least eight investigators, including an Israeli, took part in the long interrogation process.

"Some of my friends said one particular investigator spoke Arabic with a Hebraic accent."

Nageh claimed that investigators tried to "blackmail" him by threatening to go after his family.

"They also used to keep standing for hours with my eyes blindfolded and whenever it tried to move they kicked me," he said, adding that others were "slapped on the face."

After 30 nightmarish days, CIA agents found no evidence Nageh was involved in "terrorist operations" and decided to release him.

"Only then did we realize we were at an Addis Ababa suburb."

Nageh was given back his Tunisian passport and put on a fight for Cairo.