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| Europe |
| New trial for France's 'Guantanamo six' |
| 2007-12-05 |
| A Paris court Monday heard details of a controversial French secret service mission to Guantanamo at the start of the retrial on terrorism charges of six former inmates at the US base. At the end of the original trial last year, Judge Jean-Claude Kross refused to hand down a verdict, saying he needed to know more about the Guantanamo mission -- whose very existence France initially denied. Mourad Benchellali, 26, Nizar Sassi, 27, Khaled Ben Mustapha, 35, Redouane Khalid, 39, Brahim Yadel, 37, and Imad Achab Kanouni, 30, were captured in 2001 during the US-led war to oust the Taliban in Afghanistan and handed over to US forces. Held for up to three years at the Guantanamo detention centre in Cuba, they were charged upon their return to France in 2004 and 2005 with "criminal conspiracy in relation to a terrorist enterprise. But defence lawyers argue that any information derived from their questioning by French intelligence officials in Guantanamo, outside of any legal framework, should be classed as inadmissible evidence. On Monday judge Kross read out several reports by the DST domestic intelligence agency, declassified for the purposes of the trial, which he said "give us a knowledge of the DST's activities" in Guantanamo "and the framework in which all of this happened." The DST files describe the six defendants' links to well-known Islamist circles including figures cited in several terrorism cases, but say they have committed no offence prosecutable in France. In a note dated February 2004, former DST chief Louis Caprioli wrote: "In case of a repatriation, there is no guarantee they will be placed under investigation and jailed, since they are linked to no activities in France liable for prosecution." Lawyer William Bourdon welcomed the declassification of the intelligence reports. "We hope the court will draw the consequences of the extreme disloyalty with which the French secret services behaved towards the French detainees Guantanamo," he told reporters. "We hope that the court will recall the law: by saying that no one can be convicted if the proof was secured by disloyal means. Acquittal is the only outcome." During their initial 10-day trial last year, some of the six admitted to staying in Afghan camps linked to Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, but all denied fighting US forces or planning attacks in Europe. Last year the French state attorney called for all but Kanouni to be found guilty, but asked for lenient, one-year prison sentences, saying their "abnormal detention" in Guantanamo should be taken into account. Though none is currently in detention, all six spent periods in pre-trial custody and could therefore expect to avoid jail. All but Yadel -- held up for professional reasons -- were present for Monday's hearing. The trial is set to run until December 12. |
| Posted by:lotp |
| #1 So while Chirac was busy accusing us of war crimes in Gitmo, his intelligence service was interogating French citizens in the same garden spot. How breath-takingly hypocritical, yet totally in character. Al |
| Posted by: Frozen Al 2007-12-05 17:29 |