Abuse 'shames U.S. flag'

• Samir Naji describes conditions in Guantanamo Bay detention camp


• Naji says he was interrogated for three months by two teams, running shifts round the clock


• Interrogators abused him, forced him to look at degrading pornography, he claims


• Treatment shames American flag hanging in the prison corridor, Naji says

Editor's note: Samir Naji is a Yemeni who was accused of serving in Osama bin Laden's security detail and imprisoned for nearly 13 years without charge in Guantanamo Bay. He was cleared for release in 2009, but remains in detention. The following first-person testimony, recorded during his most recent meeting with lawyers from the international human rights organization Reprieve, has just been released by prison censors. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely his.Also see: Closing Guantanamo: Who's left and what's in the way

Guantanamo Bay, Cuba (CNN) -- I've heard that the Senate report on CIA torture is 6,000 pages long. My story, though, takes place elsewhere: in Guantanamo, away from the CIA program that the report covers. The 6,000 pages of the Senate report are just the start of what Americans have to accept happened in their name.

It starts and ends in the silence of a tiny, freezing cold cell, alone.

President Barack Obama signed an executive order on January 22, 2009, to close the detention facilities at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, within a year. Five years later, the prison for terrorism suspects remains open, with 136 detainees (as of December 2014). Click through for a look inside the controversial facility. Here, President George W. Bush's official picture is replaced by Obama's in the lobby of the headquarters of the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo on January 20, 2009, the day the latter was sworn in as president.

The U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay has held terror suspects since January 2002. Early in the war on terror, the Bush administration argued these detainees were "enemy combatants" who didn't have the protections accorded to prisoners of war under the Geneva Conventions. Here, a detainee stands at an interior fence at Guantanamo Bay in October 2009.

A Navy sailor surveys the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay in October 2009. In December 2013, Congress passed a defense spending bill that makes it easier to transfer detainees out of the facility.

U.S. military guards move a detainee inside the detention center in September 2010. At its peak, the detainee population exceeded 750 men at Guantanamo.

A military doctor holds a feeding tube used to feed detainees on a hunger strike at a Camp Delta hospital at Guantanamo in June 2013. In March 2013, the U.S. military announced that dozens of detainees had begun a hunger strike. By that June, more than 100 detainees were on a hunger strike, and more than 40 were being force-fed, military officials said.

Muslim detainees kneel during early morning prayers in October 2009. Cells are marked with an arrow pointing in the direction of Mecca, regarded as Islam's holy city.

A soldier stands near a placard on the fence line of the detention facility in January 2012.

A Quran sits among a display of items isssued to detainees in September 2010. The suspects are given a prayer mat and a copy of the Muslim holy book as well as a toothbrush, soap, shampoo and clothing.

A U.S. military guard walks out of the maximum security section of the detention center in September 2010.

A German shepherd police dog undergoes training exercises in October 2009 at Guantanamo Bay.

A camp librarian views artwork painted by detainees in September 2010.

A detainee rubs his face while attending a "life skills" class inside the Camp 6 high-security detention facility in April 2009.

A seat and shackle await a detainee in the DVD room of the maximum security Camp 5 detention center in March 2010.

U.S. Marines join in martial arts training at the U.S. naval base in September 2010.

Members of the military walk the hallway of Cell Block C in the Camp 5 detention facility in January 2012.

Guards move a detainee from his cell in Cell Block A of the Camp 6 detention facility in January 2012.

A detainee waits for lunch in September 2010. The cost of building Guantanamo's high-security detention facilities was reportedly about $54 million.

Marines get an early-morning workout at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay in October 2009.

A bus carries military guards from their night shift at the detention center in September 2010.

A military guard puts on gloves before moving a detainee within the detention center in September 2010.

Members of the U.S. Navy move down the hallway of Cell Block C in the Camp 5 detention facility in January 2012.

A U.S. military guard holds shackles before preparing to move a detainee in September 2010.

An American flag flies over Camp 6 at Guantanamo in June 2013.

Photos: Inside Guantanamo Bay

Photos: Inside Guantanamo Bay

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Photos: Inside Guantanamo Bay

That's when you hold yourself in a ball, and fight to ignore the confusion of what has just happened to you, and the fear of what might be coming next. Or the fear that comes when you realize that no one is coming to help; that the life, family and friends you knew are all far, far away.

The cell door opens. The next session, seemingly the 100th in a row. I think my first period of interrogation lasted three full months. Two teams of interrogators running shifts, day and night.

Each session begins with shouting, to wake me up. Then they hit me on the face and the back. I am so desperate for sleep, my head is swimming. There are photographs of faces stuck all around the walls of this room. They demand that I identify the individuals, but I can barely focus to see if I might know them. The shouting and the insults get louder, and then they nod to a man in the corner. He injects me twice in the arm with some unknown substance. It's the last thing I know.

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The freezing cold cell. The cell door opens. This time the guards enter, making awful honking noises, like wild animals.

I tried to refuse to eat the little food they bring me, in protest at all this. The interrogator laughs at me, but then turns angry; he swears loudly, and pours an army meal pack over my head. They tell the man in the corner to start feeding me intravenously. He inserts the tube in two different places on my arm and makes it bleed.

Closing Guantanamo: Who's left and what's in the way

The freezing cold cell. The cell door opens. This time the guards push me on the floor and take turns trampling over my back.

I tell the interrogators that I can't face not eating any more. They throw food on the floor of the room and tell me to eat like a pig. They won't let me go to the restroom. They watch as it gets more painful, and laugh as they get the translator to describe how they will rape me if I pee in my pants.

The freezing cold cell. The cell door opens. They make me stand and salute the American flag.

I'm in a sort of cinema room, where I have to watch videos of other prisoners being abused. Then they tell me that I have to dance for them, and run in circles whilst they pull on my chains. Every time I try and refuse, they touch me in my most private areas.

Our stories, and our continued detention, cannot be made to disappear.

Samir Naji al Hasan Moqbel

The freezing cold cell. The cell door opens. It has rained, and there are muddy puddles everywhere. I'm shackled, so I can't really walk; they deliberately drag me through the muddy puddles.

Now it's the pornography room. Awful pictures everywhere. There is one with a man and a donkey. I'm stripped naked and have my beard shaved, in a gratuitous insult to my religion. I'm shown pornographic pictures of women. I'm told to make the noises of different animals, and when I refuse, they just hit me. It ends with them pouring cold water all over me.

Hours later in my cell, I am discovered, nearly frozen. The doctor tells them to bring me urgently to the clinic, where I am given a blanket and treatment. Over the next hours, they observe me as I warm up. They are just waiting for the moment that they can sign off on my return to interrogation.

Four years ago, six U.S. government security agencies sat together and reviewed my case. Their conclusion? That I was innocent of any crime and should be released. The dirty and sadistic methods I endured -- which were then taken directly to Abu Ghraib -- achieved nothing, except to shame that American flag hanging in the prison corridor, which I was made to salute.

One hundred and thirty-six prisoners are still being held at Guantanamo, whilst the politicians squabble over how to black out the Senate report. America cannot keep hiding from its past, and its present, like this. Our stories, and our continued detention, cannot be made to disappear.

READ: CIA misled public on torture, Senate report says