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U.S. Forms Tribunal for 3 Terror Suspects
The U.S. military has formed a five-member military tribunal to preside over the first trials of terror suspects held at its naval base in Guantanamo Bay, officials said Tuesday. An Australian and two alleged bodyguards of Osama bin laden will be the first defendants. The Pentagon announcement came a day after the Supreme Court ruled that prisoners at Guantanamo Bay can appeal their detention to civilian courts. That ruling was a blow to President Bush's stance that the United States can jail terror suspects without judicial review and that the Cuban base was outside the reach of U.S. courts. Relatives and advocates are now planning hundreds of lawsuits to challenge the detainees' captivity.
Same ruling said that Bush had the right to hold him. Don't plan on seeing Junior this Ramadan, folks.
The trials - of an Australian, a Sudanese and a Yemeni - would be the first military tribunals convened by the United States since the end of World War II. "This is an important first step," Air Force Maj. John Smith, a lawyer who helped draft the tribunal rules, said in a telephone interview from the Pentagon. "We'd like to have a case tried by the end of the year." Smith said the trials would be held at the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay. The first to be tried will be David Hicks of Australia, Ali Hamza Ahmed Sulayman al Bahlul of Yemen and Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud al Qosi of Sudan - the only detainees charged to date, and three of only four allowed access to lawyers. The men have been charged with conspiracy to commit war crimes and other offenses that carry sentences of up to life imprisonment, the Pentagon has said, ruling out death sentences for the three.

Smith said Monday's Supreme Court ruling did not affect the tribunals. "The Supreme Court decision right now doesn't directly affect military commissions at all," he said. "Everyone would like to move this cases forward as quickly as possible." But Tuesday's move likely was aimed at assuring people that detainees are not being held arbitrarily following the Supreme Court ruling, said Neal Katyal, a constitutional law professor at Georgetown University. The military could also have been waiting to see how far the Supreme Court would go, said Thomas H. Lee, a Fordham University law professor and former Navy intelligence officer. "There's nothing in the ruling that says a military tribunal is inadequate," he noted.
"Please don't throw us into the briar patch." Heh.

Posted by: Steve White 2004-06-30
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=36784