Guantanamo lawyer found dead in apparent suicide

A US lawmaker who represented detainees at the US infamous Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba has been found dead in an apparent suicide, report says.

The body of Andy Hart was discovered last week, an investigative blog, Truthout, said in a report on Wednesday.

The report said the news of the lawyer’s death came from a Guantanamo investigator on Wednesday, adding the 38-year-old attorney died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

The location of the attorney’s death has not been revealed, but he reportedly left behind a suicide note.

Hart, the US federal public defender, had formerly represented Kahlid Saad Mohammed, a prisoner from Saudi Arabia who was sent back to his country in 2009.

The US administration assigned Hart to defend Mohammed Rahim al-Afghani, who was arrested by CIA and allegedly subjected to torture until being transferred to Guantanamo in 2008.

The Guantanamo prison was initially established at a US naval base in Cuba on January 11, 2002, under former US President George W. Bush.

The US holds about 166 men at the prison. Around 130 prisoners are on a hunger strike to protest against prison conditions and their indefinite confinement.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) urged Obama to mend the situation in Guantanamo amid an ongoing hunger strike that started on February 6.