Quotes from Mohamedou Ould Slahi

I believe the U.S. government owes it to the American people to tell them the truth about what is happening in Guantanamo.

Many nights I wake up not able to breathe. I think I'm in Guantanamo Bay. I'm crying and shouting and making it very hard for the people that are with me in the room to sleep.

Bad people always want to blend into a crowd.

I had nothing in my cell. Most of the time I recited the Quran. The rest of the time I was speaking to myself and thinking about my life and the worst-case scenarios that could happen to me.

Humiliation, sexual harassment, fear and starvation was the order of the day until around 10 P. M. Interrogators made sure that I had no clue about the time, but nobody is perfect; their watches always revealed it.

I started to hallucinate and hear voices as clear as crystal. I heard my family in a casual familial conversation I heard Koran readings in a heavenly voice. I heard music from my country. Later on the guards used these hallucinations and started talking with funny voices through the plumbing, encouraging me to hurt the guard and plot an escape.

Everything a detainee says is classified. Detainees cannot talk to you. They cannot talk to anyone. They cannot challenge, in a meaningful way, their detention. All that is left is for people who survived Guantanamo Bay to speak for people who are left behind, and speak for those who are in so many Guantanamos, plural, in my part of the world.

But when you embrace your weakness, that's when you become strong.

There is no war between Muslims and Americans. There is no war between Americans and the poor people in the world. There is only a war between people on the top who have their own agenda.

I'm not a convicted felon.

English accepts more curses than any other language, and I soon learned to curse with the commoners.

Writing is like driving a car. Writing the beats of a screenplay? It's like driving a rover on Mars. You have to be absolutely, extremely precise.

But the problem is that you cannot just admit to something you haven't done; you need to deliver the details, which you can't when you haven't done anything. It's not just, Yes, I did!' No, it doesn't work that way: you have to make up a complete story that makes sense to the dumbest dummies.

I got used to interrogators asking me the same things. Before the interrogator even moves his lips I knew his questions, and as soon as he or she started to talk I turned my 'tape' on.

Gitmo is everywhere in the world. We need to raise awareness of illegal prisons in Middle East, Asia, and Africa. This needs to be brought to the attention of the U.N. This needs to stop.

I felt bad for everybody I hurt with my false testimonies.

I have only written what I experienced, what I saw, what I learned first-hand.

When people look at one thing from one perspective, they certainly fail to get the whole picture, and that is the main reason for the majority of misunderstandings that sometimes lead to bloody confrontations.

I hated the compound, I hated the dark, dirty room, I hated the filthy bathroom, and I hated everything about it, especially the constant state of terror and fear.

They dedicated the whole time until around Nov. 10, 2003 to questioning me about Canada and Sept. 11; they didn't ask me a single question about Germany, where I really had the center of gravity of my life.

When I came to Afghanistan, I couldn't choose the training camp; al Qaeda and the Arabs ran the camps. I said, 'Hey, I want to help.' They said I could not until I had training. I said, 'OK, I'll take the training.'

I believed excessively in Conspiracy Theories - though maybe not as much as the U.S. government does.

Many people take daylight for granted, but if you are forbidden to see it, you will appreciate it.

I'm sure if there is a debate, Guantanamo Bay must be closed. And it should be closed, because it does not belong in a democracy.