SAMAR Magazine just dropped their latest issue and highlighted a campaign I knew little about – the FreeFahad Campaign.
On February 10, 2010, SAMAR in collaboration with THAW (Theaters Against War) put out a call for letters to be sent to Fahad Hashmi at the Metropolitan Correctional Center (MCC). Fahad has been held in pre-trial detention at the MCC for over 850 days in severe solitary confinement. He has been detained over 1,350 days in all (more about Fahad’s case: freefahad.com). [samarmagazine]
The following mini-documentary enlightens us more on the who Fahad is and the situation he finds himself in.
It’s a horrible situation, and the charges against him are reflective of a civil rights injustice that continues to establish how Desis, 2nd-generation immigrants, and Muslims are not given equal rights provided to the “other” Americans. At nine years after 9/11, this case is clearly evidence that the South Asian American community is still feeling the repercussions of the Patriot Act, at least in the legal system.
The FreeFahad campaign is asking for people to write a letter to Fahad in prison. Though the chances of Fahad receiving the letter is slim, the campaign hopes the act of writing the letters will “offer a simple and necessary challenge to the inhuman conditions of Fahad’s detention and help send a message to Fahad’s jailers, the U.S. Government and Attorney General Holder, that the world at large cares for Fahad and is outraged at the violations of his civil and human rights.” Continue reading