Saudi Arabia offers few prospects for the bright young Mohammed El-Gharani.
With roots in Chad, Mohammed is treated like a second-class citizen. His access to healthcare and education are restricted; nor can he make the most of his entrepreneurial spirit. At the age of 14, having scraped together some money as a street trader, Mohammed seizes an opportunity to study in Pakistan.
One Friday in Karachi, Mohammed is detained during a raid on his local mosque. After being beaten and interrogated, he is sold to the American government by the Pakistani forces as a member of Al-Qaida with links to Osama Bin Laden, but Mohammed has heard of neither. The Americans fly him first to Kandahar and then to Guantánamo Bay.
In Guantánamo Kid, Jérôme Tubiana and Alexandre Franc tell the eye-opening, heart-wrenching story of one of Guantánamo's youngest detainees.
A revealing and compelling graphic biography of Guantánamo Bay detainee Mohammed El Gharani - the life journey that led to his incarceration and the experience of interrogation, torture and abuse in custody. Franc also provided the art for "Agatha: The Real Life Of Agatha Christie".
"Mohammed El-Gharani was just 14 when he was kidnapped and rendered to Guantánamo Bay, the location of some of the worst human rights abuses of our age. There, he was detained without charge or trial, facing brutal torture, isolation and mistreatment. The US accused him of having been an Al-Qaeda mastermind at the tender age of 6 in a country he had never visited, and his story exposes the cruel absurdity of the US' Guantánamo project and the faulty 'intelligence' it was built on. Yet, despite all this, his is a story of survival in even the darkest of times. Guantánamo Kid is a book everyone should read - an innovative, visually stunning way of telling an important story. And a powerful way to remind us that the Guantánamo story is one that is still being played out to this day as 40 men continue to languish in the prison, watching the months and years pass by with no access to justice and very little hope for freedom."
