More than 200 detainees in Guantnamo Bay are in their fifth week of a hunger strike.

Statements from prisoners in the camp, which were declassified by the US Government on Wednesday, reveal that the men are starving themselves in protest towards the conditions in the camp and their alleged maltreatment - including desecration of the Koran - by American guards.

The statements, written on August 11, have just been given to the British human rights lawyer Clive Stafford Smith. They show that prisoners are determined to starve themselves to death. In one, Binyam Mohammed, a former London schoolboy, said: "I do not plan to stop until I either die, or we are respected."

"People will definitely die. Bobby Sands petitioned the British Government to stop the illegitimate internment of Irishmen without trial. He had the courage of his convictions, and he starved himself to death. Nobody should believe for one moment that my brothers here have less courage."

On Thursday, Stafford Smith, who represents 40 detainees at Guantnamo Bay, eight of whom are British residents, said many men had been starving themselves for more than four weeks and the situation was becoming desperate.

He said: "I am worried about the lives of my guys because they are a pretty obstinate lot, and they are going to go through with this and I think they are going to end up killing themselves. The American military doesn't want anyone to know about this."

He pointed to an American army claim that only 76 prisoners at the base were refusing food, saying that they were attempting to play down what could be a political scandal if a prisoners were to die.

The hunger strike is the second since late June. The first ended after the authorities made a number of promises, including better access to books and bottled drinking water.

The men claim that they were tricked into eating again.

In his statement, Mohammed described how during the first strike men were placed on intravenous drips after refusing food for 20 days.

He said: "The administration promised that if we gave them 10 days, they would bring the prison into compliance with the Geneva conventions. They said this had been approved by Donald Rumsfeld himself in Washington, DC. As a result of these promises, we agreed to end the strike on July 28."

In another declassified statement, Omar Deghayes, from Brighton, said: "In July, some people took no water for many days. I was part of the strike and I am again this time. Some people were taken to hospital, and put on drip feeds, but they pulled the needles out, as they preferred to die. There were two doctors. One wanted to force feed the men, but they got legal advice saying that they could not if the men refused."

On Thursday, Deghayes's brother, Abubaker, pleaded with the British Government to intervene on his brother's behalf. "I'm really worried," he said. "Something really needs to be done. We cannot just allow people to be oppressed and tortured."

Source: China Daily