KHALID Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, is to face the death penalty at the hands of a United States military tribunal, along with five other detainees at Guantanamo Bay, the Pentagon announced yesterday.
The charges sought by the Pentagon include conspiring with al-Qaeda to attack and murder civilians and 2,973 counts of murder for those killed in the September 11 attacks, when four hijacked passenger planes crashed into New York's World Trade Centre
, the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania.
The charges – which must be approved by a Pentagon appointee who oversees the military court at Guantanamo before a trial can be ordered – are the first from that court alleging direct involvement in the 2001 attacks, and the first involving the death penalty.
"These charges allege a long-term, highly sophisticated, organised plan by al-Qaeda to attack the United States," said Brigadier-General Thomas Hartmann, the legal adviser to the tribunal system. He added that the charges have been sworn "against six individuals alleged to be responsible for the planning and execution of the attacks" in 2001.
The military will recommend the six men be tried together before a military tribunal. But recent revelations that Mohammed was subject to a harsh CIA interrogation technique known as waterboarding – which critics call torture – has clouded the case. It involves strapping a person down and pouring water over the suspect's cloth-covered face to create the sensation of drowning.
The other five men being charged are: Mohammed al-Qahtani, labelled the "20th hijacker"; Ramzi Binalshibh, said to have been the main intermediary between the hijackers and al-Qaeda leaders; Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali, known as Ammar al-Baluchi, a nephew of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who has been identified as Mohammed's lieutenant for the 2001 operation; al-Baluchi's assistant, Mustafa Ahmad al-Hawsawi; and Waleed bin Attash, known as Khallad, who is accused of selecting and training some of the hijackers.
In Guantanamo Bay hearings that have been criticised as unfair, Mohammed confessed last March to the 9/11 attack and a string of other plots. "I was responsible for the 9/11 operation from A to Z," Mohammed said in a statement, according to transcripts later released by the Pentagon.
The men would be tried in the military tribunal system that was set up by the Bush administration and has been widely criticised for its rules on legal representation for suspects, hearings behind closed doors and past allegations of inmate abuse at Guantanamo.
Brig-Gen Hartmann said yesterday that the defendants would have the same rights as US soldiers tried under the military justice system. He called the charges sworn yesterday "only allegations".
The decision to seek the death penalty is also likely to draw criticism from the international community. A number of countries, including US allies, have said they would object to the use of capital punishment for their nationals held at Guantanamo.
Mohammed was among 15 "high-value detainees" who were held at length by the CIA in secret overseas prisons before being handed over to the military in 2006.
The full article contains 528 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
