Guantanamo detainees sent to Kuwait, Belgium

Belgium on Friday became the latest European nation to resettle a freshly released Guantánamo detainee, confirming ``the free man'' would be provided work papers and ``a smooth integration into society.''

State-run Belgian media said the freed captive, who was pointedly not identified, arrived at the military airport in Melsbroek.

A foreign ministry statement urged the media to protect his privacy, noting he was being offered an opportunity to integrate into Belgian society ``after a particularly difficult time in Guantánamo.''

It did not elaborate but emphasized that the former detainee, whose nation of birth was also withheld, had been cleared of charges by a U.S. court.

``He comes to Belgium as a free man, and all the necessary measures for adaptation and rapid integration are being provided,'' it said. Bermuda, France, Ireland and Portugal have also granted resettlement privileges to foreign men once held at the prison camps whom the Obama administration has chosen to let go. Spain and the Pacific island nation of Palau have said they would soon follow.

The latest U.S. military transport mission from the remote Navy base, coupled with Kuwait sending a jet to collect cleared captive Khalid Mutairi, 34, raised to 20 the number of detainees sent from the base this year.

Eighteen were freed. One was sent to New York for trial as an alleged co-conspirator in the East Africa embassies bombing and the 20th committed suicide and his remains were repatriated to Yemen.

It also lowered to 221 the detainee census at the prison camps, of whom the Pentagon's war crimes prosecutor says perhaps 65 might face military trial. Ten are currently charged.

Ambassador Daniel Fried, President Barack Obama's Guantánamo closure czar, has been shuttling between the State Department and Europe, mostly, to find countries to absorb long-held war on terror prisoners that the new administration has concluded are safe enough to let go.

Mutairi went home three months after a federal judge in Washington ruled the Pentagon evidence against him was insufficient to hold him. Defense lawyers said he was inaugurating a Kuwaiti rehabilitation center at the emirate designed to help men jailed for years as jihadists reenter society in the oil-rich emirate.

``The new facility will provide detainees with access to education, medical care, group discussions and physical exercise to help them recover from their long ordeal in Guantánamo,'' said a statement issued by a Kuwaiti support group that announced Mutairi's repatriation.

Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly has likewise cleared fellow Kuwaiti Fouad Rabia, 50, on grounds he was held for years in a case of mistaken identity but the Justice and Defense Department's are still studying his file to decide whether to appeal to another civilian court rather than let him go.

A U.S. Justice Department statement identified Mutairi but withheld the name of the other man freed noting the privacy consideration was at the request of the Government of Belgium.

The transfer to Belgium came one month after a team of experts visited the prison camps in southeast Cuba to interview a candidate for resettlement who had been suggested by the Obama administration.

Spain may be next to receive up to three men freed from Guantanamo. The EFE news agency reported on Thursday that Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero planned to conclude the agreement with Obama during a White House visit next week. | 10/11/09 01:23:08 By - Carol Rosenberg

Graham moves to block Obama from trying 9/11 suspects in U.S.

South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham said Friday that he'd attached an amendment to an appropriations bill that would prohibit the Obama administration from spending money on the prosecution and trial of the accused terrorists before U.S. civilian federal judges. | 10/09/09 21:31:15 By - James Rosen

New group of soldiers going to Guantanamo -- for a year

The Puerto Rican National Guard is heading home soon and soldiers from their Virgin Islands and Rhode Island counterparts are mobilizing for yearlong tours at the detention center President Barack Obama said he would shut in January. | 10/07/09 20:24:20 By - Carol Rosenberg

Canadian held at Guantanamo gets two new civilian lawyers

Omar Khadr, a Canadian who's accused of throwing a grenade that killed an American soldier in Afghanistan, will be represented by a pair of former U.S. federal prosecutors -- if he's ever brought to trial. Khadr was only 15 when the alleged attack took place and his new lawyers say they'll argue he was too young to face a war crimes tribunal. | 10/07/09 18:05:23 By - Carol Rosenberg

U.S. admits it has no case against teen held at Guantanamo

The Justice Department conceded Friday that it lacks the evidence to hold a teenage Guantanamo detainee as an enemy combatant after a federal judge last week ruled that his confession was inadmissible. The Afghan government said Mohammed Jawad was 12 years old when he was seized by U.S. troops. | 10/06/09 17:21:35 By - Marisa Taylor

U.S. says it's willing to send young Afghan detainee home

The Obama administration on Wednesday said it plans to release Mohammed Jawad after military and civilian judges banned almost all evidence against him that they ruled was extracted through torture. Government attorneys, however, reserved the right to file new charges in federal court against Mohammed Jawad if they find evidence against him in the next three weeks, he time needed to set him free. | 10/06/09 17:21:09 By - Marisa Taylor

Military officially drops charges against Mohammed Jawad

Pentagon prosecutor Navy Capt. John Murphy notified the military commission that charges were being withdrawn in a one-sentence filing that provided no reason for the dismissal. On Thursday, U.S. District Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle ruled that Jawad was being detained illegally at Guantanamo and ordered the Obama administration to release him by Aug. 21. | 10/06/09 17:20:41 By - McClatchy Newspapers

Attorneys ask that Guantanamo detainee be sent home

Last week, the Justice Department acknowledged it had no evidence that Mohammed Jawad was an enemy combatant. Tuesday, his attorneys asked that he be released and said the Afghan government would provide a plane to take him home. Jawad has been moved to an area reserved for prisoners ready for release, where his attorney said he's "learning to play the Wii." | 10/06/09 17:20:08 By - Carol Rosenberg

Guantanamo prisoner detained as teen meets with Karzai

Mohammed Jawad's six-year imprisonment came to symbolize much of what was wrong with the Bush administration's war on terror policies. His confession to throwing a grenade that wounded two American soldiers was ultimately thrown out by a U.S. military judge as coerced by torture. A federal judge last month ordered the U.S. government to release him, saying that without the confession there was no evidence to hold him. His uncle told McClatchy today that no U.S. investigator ever came to talk to him, though his defense attorney came twice. Jawad may have been 14 years old when he was detained. | 10/06/09 17:19:13 By - Jonathan S. Landay and Carol Rosenberg

Probe: Yemeni detainee at Guantanamo committed suicide

A Navy criminal investigation has concluded that a Yemeni man found dead in the Guantanamo prison camps' psychiatric ward in June committed suicide, the detention center commander said Tuesday. It's the fifth suspected suicide at the camp. | 10/06/09 16:59:50 By - Carol Rosenberg

Judge's order to release Kuwaiti detainee puts Obama in a bind

A year ago, an Air Force prosecutor swore out charges of conspiracy and providing material support to a terrorist organization against Fouad al Rabia, a 50-year-old Kuwaiti aviation engineer who was seized by U.S. forces in Afghanistan nearly eight years ago. Now a U.S. district court judge in Washington has ordered him released from the Guantanamo military prison, saying the government has presented no evidence of his guilt. | 10/05/09 17:49:16 By - Carol Rosenberg

Judges siding with detainees in Guantanamo habeas cases

Fifteen months after the U.S. Supreme Court rebuked the Bush administration by ruling that Guantanamo captives can sue for their freedom, civilian judges have ordered the release of 29 detainees and sided with the Defense Department only seven times. There are still scores of cases to be decided, but if the trend holds, it suggests that Guantanamo isn't holding just the "worst of the worst." | 10/05/09 17:52:01 By - Carol Rosenberg

4 prosecutors vie to try 9/11 suspects in civilian courts

Four different civilian prosecutors' offices — two in New York, two near the Pentagon — are studying whether to charge and put on trial five alleged 9/11 conspirators. The Pentagon's chief war crimes prosecutor revealed the behind-the-scenes rivalry in comments to reporters at Guantanamo, where the suspects are currently being held. | 10/05/09 17:49:58 By - Carol Rosenberg

U.S. releases 3 Guantanamo prisoners to Yemen, Ireland

Even as the White House left doubt on whether it would meet its own prison camps closure deadline, the Obama administration said Saturday it had freed three detainees from Guantánamo — one by order of a federal judge to Yemen, two others for new lives in Ireland. | 09/27/09 01:13:57 By - Carol Rosenberg

U.S. says some Uighurs soon to leave Guantanamo

In a letter to the Supreme Court, the solicitor general said six Guantanamo detainees from China have accepted an offer from the Pacific island nation of Palau to resettle there. The court is considering whether to hear a case that could undercut the government's ability to hold prisoners that judges have ordered freed. | 09/24/09 20:08:56 By - Michael Doyle and Marisa Taylor

Algerian seized with Abu Zubaydah loses habeas case

A federal judge has upheld as lawful the indefinite detention of an Algerian accused of being an al Qaeda bomb maker, raising the tally of U.S. government victories in Guantanamo habeas corpus lawsuits to eight. The government has lost in 30 other cases. Sufiyan Barhoumi, 36, was arrested in a Pakistan safe house along with Abu Zubaydah, the first CIA secret detainee to undergo waterboarding. | 09/24/09 14:59:43 By - Carol Rosenberg

Alleged 9/11 mastermind given copy of My Lai massacre film

War court prosecutor Robert Swann said Monday that he'd arranged for alleged al Qaeda kingpin Khalid Sheik Mohammed to get a copy of Judgment: The Court Martial of Lt. William Calley, a 1975 docudrama about an American Army officer held responsible for the murder of Vietnamese civilians by a squad of U.S. soldiers. | 09/21/09 20:29:38 By - Carol Rosenberg

Guantanamo judge delays 9/11 cases; civilian trials pondered

The military judge overseeing the 9/11 mass murder case on Monday approved a 60-day delay in the proceedings to give the Obama administration time to decide whether to try the cases in U.S. civilian courts. On Sunday, the military's chief prosecutor said four U.S. attorneys in the United States are vying for the right to try the suspects. | 09/21/09 16:43:23 By - Carol Rosenberg

Yet another Kuwaiti at Guantanamo is ordered freed

U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly late Thursday ordered the Obama administration to released Fouad al Rabia, a 50-year-old Kuwaiti aeronautics engineer who's been held at Guantanamo since 2002. He is the 30th detainee ordered released since prisoners at the U.S. detention center in Cuba won the right to challenge their imprisonment in U.S. civilian courts. | 09/17/09 23:35:37 By - Carol Rosenberg

Administration defends military commissions but wants delay in hearings

The Obama administration Wednesday broadly defended as constitutional its predecessor's format for military commissions at Guantanamo but said it would seek to delay next week's sanity hearings in a Sept. 11 case while it revamps its war on terror prosecution strategy. | 09/16/09 17:30:50 By - Carol Rosenberg

Algerians, freed from Guantanamo, still paying the price

In 2001, the Bosnian government, at the insistence of American officials, arrested six Algeria-born Bosnians and accused them of plotting to bomb the U.S. embassy in Sarajevo. Despite a Bosnian investigation that found no evidence for the charge, the six were turned over to U.S. authorities who flew them to Guantanamo. Now, five of the six have been released. But their lives have hardly returned to normal. | 09/10/09 06:00:00 By - Seema Jilani, M.D.

New photos emerge of alleged 9/11 plotter at Guantanamo

Pictures of accused 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed and his nephew posing for Red Cross delegates this summer at Guantanamo turned up on the Web Wednesday, offering a rare glimpse into life inside the prison's secret Camp 7 just days ahead of the anniversary of the Sept. 11 terror attacks. The pictures were taken in July under an agreement that lets Red Cross delegates photograph detainees and send photos to family members. | 09/09/09 11:00:58 By - Carol Rosenberg

Read the rulings in the decided cases

Here are the rulings issued so far in habeas corpus cases filed by detainees at Guantanamo Bay. | 09/07/09 22:05:47 By - Carol Rosenberg

Belgium offers asylum to Guantanamo detainee

Belgium on Friday became the latest European country to offer asylum to a Guantanamo Bay detainee, announcing that it would resettle a captive now at the prison camps who has been cleared of prosecution by a U.S. court. | 09/04/09 17:44:07 By - Carol Rosenberg

Pentagon lawyers: First Amendment protects Al Qaida propaganda

Pentagon defense lawyers this week appealed the war crimes conviction of Osama bin Laden's media secretary at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, on free speech grounds. They argued that filmmaker Ali Hamza al Bahlul of Yemen was simply exercising his First Amendment rights when he spliced together footage of fiery Osama bin Laden speeches into a recruiting film. | 09/02/09 17:04:31 By - Carol Rosenberg

Judge rules U.S. detention of Kuwaiti at Guantanamo is legal

U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Ketelly's ruling that Fawzi al Odah was in fact an al Qaida foot soldier when he was captured in Afghanistan in December 2001 and therefore can be held legally as an enemy combatant is a rare victory for the government in habeas hearings. So far, judges have ordered the release 29 Guantanamo prisoners, while endorsing the continued detention of only seven. | 09/01/09 12:46:12 By - Carol Rosenberg

Court documents name detainees sent to Portugal

The two Guantanamo detainees sent to Portugal last week were a Syrian man whose father is still held at the prison camps and a former Syrian Army recruit once accused of joining forces with Afghanistan's Taliban militia, according to court documents made public Monday. | 08/31/09 12:41:38 By - Carol Rosenberg

U.S. sends two Syrians from Guantanamo to Portugal

The U.S. government has sent two Syrian men -- who had been held for years as war on terror captives at the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo -- to Portugal for resettlement, the Justice Department announced Friday. | 08/28/09 19:10:15 By - Carol Rosenberg

Army judge: 9/11 lawyers can't see CIA 'black sites'

A military judge says defense lawyers for an alleged Sept. 11 plotter held at Guantanamo don't need to inspect secret CIA overseas prisons to determine whether the accused al Qaeda terrorist is competent to stand trial. | 08/25/09 14:20:25 By - Carol Rosenberg

Shackles and blindfold for freed detainee on his way home

A young Afghan held for six years at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, rejoined his family in southern Kabul late Monday, ending an odyssey that came to symbolize many of the problems of the Bush administration's war on terror detention policies. Mohammed Jawad arrived in Afghanistan shackled and blindfolded, his lawyer said, but ended the day being hugged by relatives after meeting with Afghan President Hamid Karzai. He was ordered released by a U.S. judge. | 08/24/09 19:03:54 By - Jonathan S. Landay, Hashim Shukoor and Carol Rosenberg

Judge orders another Guantanamo detainee released

The Yemeni father of two is the 29th Guantanamo detainee ordered freed by a U.S. federal judge after a habeas hearing. U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler ruled that the government didn't have enough evidence to hold Mohammed al Adahi, who'd been jailed at Guantanamo since 2002. She ordered the government to immediately notify Congress as required by law that he was being released. | 08/18/09 18:22:44 By - Carol Rosenberg

Canada court says its officials knew U.S. abused detainee

Canada must seek the immediate return of Toronto-born Guantanamo captive Omar Khadr rather than await the outcome of his U.S. military trial because American troops mistreated the alleged teen terrorist and Canadian officials knew about it, Canada's appeals court ruled Friday. The order effectively instructs the Canadian government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper to intervene in the case before Khadr is tried by military commission. | 08/14/09 14:07:23 By - Carol Rosenberg

Will Michigan prison become Guantanamo alternative?

Demonstrating that it's still determined to bring Guantamamo captives to U.S. soil, the Obama administration has sent a team to inspect a remote maximum-security prison in Michigan as a potential alternative to its prison camps in Cuba. The team from the Pentagon, the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security and the Bureau of Prisons will look at the facility in Standish, 145 miles northwest of Detroit, on Thursday. | 08/12/09 19:09:34 By - Carol Rosenberg

Judge: 9/11 plotter's counsel can't know how CIA treated him

U.S. military defense lawyers for accused 9/11 conspirator Ramzi bin al Shibh cannot learn what interrogation techniques CIA agents used on the Yemeni before he was moved to Guantanamo to be tried as a terrorist, an Army judge has ruled. | 08/10/09 14:47:47 By - Carol Rosenberg

Civilian trials won't be cake walks for Guantanamo detainees

Trying Guantanamo detainees in U.S. courts could prove to be a prosecutor's nightmare, haunted by allegations of torture, tainted evidence and compromised witnesses. Nevertheless, as U.S. attorneys in New York, Virginia and Washington consider whether to charge some terrorism suspects in U.S. courts, they may find comfort in their own past success. | 08/07/09 19:21:10 By - Marisa Taylor

Portugal to resettle 2 Syrians from Guantanamo

Portugal announced Friday that it will resettle two Syrian men now held as detainees at the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, following France and Ireland in the humanitarian gesture. | 08/07/09 12:50:23 By - Carol Rosenberg

Kansas GOP senators step up efforts to keep detainees out

Kansas Sens. Sam Brownback and Pat Roberts have stepped up their battle to block the Obama administration from possibly moving detainees from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to Fort Leavenworth, Kan. | 08/06/09 19:26:42 By - David Goldstein

Michigan might be open to Guantanamo detainees

Leavenworth County may be the prison capital of the United States, but don't expect leaders to roll out the welcome mat for Guantanamo Bay detainees. But in Michigan, a community desperate to keep a state prison from closing isn't as quick to dismiss the concept. | 08/04/09 06:16:03 By - Dawn Bormann and Mark Wiebe

Brownback: Kansas doesn't want Guantanamo detainees

Led by Kansas Republican Sen. Sam Brownback, national, state and local leaders came together in Leavenworth, Kan., Monday to once again oppose transferring detainees from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to Fort Leavenworth. "We don't want them here," Brownback said. | 08/03/09 15:23:30 By - Dan Bormann

Defense attorneys proving key to Guantanamo resettlement

Defense attorneys who fought the Bush administration tooth-and-nail on its detention policies are now emerging as key partners in the effort to resettle prisoners from Guantanamo. Long before Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle ordered the U.S. government to free a young Afghan named Mohammed Jawad, his military lawyers arranged with UNICEF and the Afghan Human Rights Commission to get him education and support, once back home with his mother. | 08/02/09 09:27:36 By - Carol Rosenberg

Judge orders Afghan teen home after years at Guantanamo

A young Guantanamo detainee appears likely to be sent home by late August after a federal judge concluded Thursday that he'd been held illegally and ordered him released after almost seven years. U.S. District Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle said she wanted him on his way home by Aug. 21. | 07/30/09 16:31:25 By - Marisa Taylor

9/11 victims' families: Don't close Guantanamo

Heartbroken relatives of 9/11 attack victims have emerged as a key constituency in the campaign to stop Obama from making good on his Jan. 22 executive order to empty the prison camps and revise the controversial military trials within a year. | 07/20/09 22:50:20 By - Carol Rosenberg

Five 9/11 terror suspects boycott Guantanamo hearing

All five alleged co-conspirators in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks boycotted a pretrial hearing Thursday morning, frustrating prosecutors and denying kin of victims a chance to see the men in the flesh. | 07/16/09 18:40:35 By - Carol Rosenberg

'Support for terrorism' charges in dispute at Guantanamo

Defense attorneys asked a judge to dismiss a charge of material support for terrorism against an accused terrorist held at Guantanamo, saying the Obama administration appears to have determined that the crime isn't a traditional war crime and can't be prosecuted in a military court. | 07/15/09 19:01:35 By - Carol Rosenberg

Guantanamo war court resumes hearings despite Obama-imposed delay

The Pentagon plunged forward Wednesday with pretrial hearings against eight detainees in its beleaguered war court system with challenges to both the ongoing terror prosecutions and their remote state-of-the-art technology. | 07/15/09 14:19:05 By - Carol Rosenberg

Fearful Guantanamo captive wants to stay behind

Even as the White House pledges to empty the prison camps at Guantanamo, a 30-year-old prisoner is so afraid of returning to his native Tajikistan that he is asking to stay at the U.S. Navy base in Cuba. | 07/07/09 20:06:16 By - Carol Rosenberg

Obama officials may prefer civilian trials for 9/11 plotters

The Obama administration has not yet decided where to try those accused of involvement in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks who are now held at Guantanamo Bay, government lawyers told a Senate committee on Tuesday. The fact that the 9/11 attacks targeted civilians inside the continental United States argues for a civlian trial, said one. | 07/07/09 15:39:04 By - Carol Rosenberg

Guantanamo sends 3 more detainees to Saudi Arabia

The Pentagon sent three Guantanamo detainees to Saudi Arabia on Friday, capping a week of far-flung transfers that the Obama administration said signaled global cooperation in its effort to close the controversial prison camps in southeast Cuba. | 06/12/09 20:05:06 By -

Congress won't try to keep Guantanamo detainees out of U.S. — for now

Congressional negotiators have agreed to drop an amendment to a defense appropriations bill that would have prevented the Obama administration from releasing any freed Guantanamao detainees into the United States or transferring them to U.S. prisons for trial. They also agreed not to ban the release of photos of detainee abuse after Obama promised to continue to oppose the photos' publication. | 06/12/09 13:31:01 By - David Lightman

Dead detainee sent from Guantanamo to Yemen

Still mum on the circumstances of the death, the United States on Thursday sent to Yemen the autopsied remains of a long-held detainee at Guantánamo who the military said committed suicide in his cell. | 06/05/09 14:30:33 By - Carol Rosenberg

Senate Democrats postpone funds to shut Guantanamo

Senate Democrats, under pressure from Republicans eager to brand them as ready to release terrorists into America's backyards, prepared Tuesday to strip $80 million for closing the prison facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, out of a war-spending bill. | 05/19/09 19:17:46 By - William Douglas and David Lightman

GOP ratchets up debate over release of Gitmo detainees

Republicans on Thursday amped up opposition to President Barack Obama's plan to close the prison camps at Guantanamo Bay, even as Attorney General Eric Holder sought to reassure senators that the United States won't release anyone it considers a terrorist. | 05/07/09 18:06:37 By - Lesley Clark

Detainee who won Guantanamo habeas case to go to France

Lakhdar Boumediene, 43, was arrested along with five other Algerians in 2001 in Bosnia, suspected in a bomb attack plot against the U.S. Embassy in Sarajevo. But he's best known for being the named plaintiff in the case that led the U.S. Supreme Court to rule that detainees held at Guantanamo have the right to challenge their imprisonment in U.S. courts. | 05/06/09 15:41:23 By -

First hearing since Obama took office set for Guantanamo

Shortly after he was inaugurated, Obama asked for and received a 120-day delay in military commission hearings against suspected terrorists held at Guantanamo. With that delay soon to expire, the military commission's chief judge has scheduled a hearing for May 27. | 05/06/09 15:03:14 By - Carol Rosenberg

House Democrats won't give Obama funds to close Gitmo

The Obama administration's bid for $50 million to move prisoners from the Guantanamo Bay detention facility was left out of the Democratic-authored emergency war spending bill unveiled Monday. Spokesmen explained there were two problems: The Pentagon has no policy in place yet for using the money, and Republicans as well as skeptical Democrats were likely to block the whole spending bill if the Guantanamo funds were included. | 05/04/09 18:21:11 By - David Lightman

McConnell asks more scrutiny of Guantanamo closing costs

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky used a Senate floor speech on Tuesday to urge more transparency in the Obama administration's plans to empty the prison camps at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, something he's opposed to doing. Obama's supplemental defense spending requests includes $81 million in money for closing the detention center. | 04/21/09 16:34:18 By - Carol Rosenberg

No decisions yet on relocation of Guantanamo detainees

The Obama administration said Monday it has made no decisions on how many of the 240 or so Guantanamo detainees will be moved to U.S. soil, and whether they will be scattered around lockups throughout the United States or concentrated in one place. | 04/13/09 13:10:37 By - Carol Rosenberg

Judge: U.S. hid witness's mental illness in Guantanamo cases

U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan ruled that the Justice Department improperly withheld important psychiatric records of a government witness who was used in a "significant" number of cases against Guantanamo detainees. One of those cases was that of a Yemeni doctor who the Justice Department announced last week it would no longer try to detain. Sullivan called the Guantanamo cases a "travesty" and "a horror story." | 04/06/09 19:17:28 By - Marisa Taylor

McClatchy wins investigative award for Guantanamo series

A McClatchy series on detainee abuse at U.S. prison facilities at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and in Afghanistan on Tuesday tied for top honors as the best newspaper investigative report of last year. | 04/01/09 03:50:44 By - McClatchy Newspapers

U.S. officials meeting with Uighur detainees in Guantanamo

A team of lawyers from the Justice Department, the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees U.S. immigration enforcement, and the Department of State is in Guantanamo to meet with 17 Uighurs imprisoned at the detention center for suspected terrorists. Last fall, a federal judge in Washington, saying there was no evidence they were terrorists, ordered them released and granted asylum in the United States. | 03/31/09 19:01:13 By - Carol Rosenberg

Guantanamo detainee to go free after Obama-ordered review

Ayman Batarfi, a Yemeni surgeon, was captured in Afghanistan in 2002 and accused of treating al Qaida wounded at Tora Bora. But his lawyers said he was simply a humanitarian worker caught up in fighting. On Monday, the Obama administration agreed, telling a federal judge in Washington that the U.S. would no longer argue for Batarfi's detention and instead would arrange for his release from Guantanamo. | 03/30/09 19:03:56 By - Carol Rosenberg

Help wanted: Pentagon seeks lawyers to defend detentions

Even as the Obama administration has dropped the term ''enemy combatant'' in reshaping its war-on-terror policy and ordered the closing of the detention center at Guantanamo, the Pentagon is advertising for lawyers to fight habeas corpus motions filed in federal court by the 200-plus captives still held in Cuba. The positions are based in Washington, D.C. | 03/28/09 08:15:42 By - Carol Rosenberg

Obama's new detainee policy: Break from Bush, or the same?

The Obama administration on Friday abandoned two key aspects of the Bush administration's policies on suspected terrorists, including the term "enemy combatant," setting off a wide debate over the status of prisoners who are detained at the Guantanamo Bay. | 03/13/09 17:27:34 By - William Douglas and Carol Rosenberg

Obama: Moving Guantanamo inmates won't harm U.S. towns

President Barack Obama noted that U.S. prisons already hold convicted terrorists and that the decision of where to put detainees now held at Guantanamo would include avoiding "a situation that elevated the risks for surrounding communities." | 03/11/09 18:54:38 By - David Goldstein

Guantanamo detainee arrives in Britain, renews torture claims

Binyam Mohamed, a gaunt-looking, bearded man wearing a cream sweater, white tennis shoes and a white skullcap, stepped off a chartered jet at a British air base Monday after a 10-hour trip from the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, closing a dark chapter in his life that he claims included torture. | 02/23/09 17:48:02 By - Julie Sell

An Air Force lawyer fights to free a Guantanamo inmate

A U.S. military lawyer blitzed London this week, calling for the immediate release of her client, who allegedly was trained in an al Qaida terrorist camp, from the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. | 02/13/09 16:23:21 By - Julie Sell

Brits say U.S. has vowed quick review of Guantanamo case

A former British resident who has been on hunger strike at the Guantanamo Bay prison since December 29th is now a “priority” case for review by the Obama administration and could return to Britain soon, Britain's Foreign Secretary said Wednesday. | 02/11/09 15:50:00 By - Julie Sell

More accuse Britain in torture of Guantanamo detainee

Despite years of denials, new questions are being raised about Britain's possible involvement in the torture of a detainee now on a prolonged hunger strike at the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba. | 02/10/09 18:25:37 By - Julie Sell

Admiral begins Guantanamo review Obama ordered

A fact-finding team led by a senior Navy official was on the ground at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, on Wednesday, checking the prison camps' compliance with the Geneva Conventions by order of President Barack Obama. | 02/04/09 15:51:57 By - Carol Rosenberg

Next step unclear as judge defies Obama on Guantanamo

The chief judge of the Guantanamo war court Thursday spurned a presidential request to freeze the military commissions for 120 days, saying he would go forward with next month's arraignment of an alleged USS Cole bomber in a capital terror case. The judge said the request would deny the public's interest in a speedy trial. | 01/29/09 18:21:51 By - Carol Rosenberg

With Guantanamo closing, where will the detainees go?

If not Guantanamo, then where? Anything but a welcoming party is forming at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas. When President Barack Obama signed an order Thursday forcing the closure of the Guantanamo Bay detention center within a year, he put in sharp relief the possibility that some of the world's most potentially dangerous terror suspects could be hauled to the military's maximum security facility in Kansas. | 01/22/09 19:20:06 By - Scott Canon and David Goldstein

Detainees could end up in South Carolina

Obama's decrees Thursday on the detention and interrogation of accused terrorists increase the likelihood that some detainees now held at the U.S. military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba will be moved to South Carolina in a year or less. | 01/22/09 18:58:54 By - James Rosen

Obama to sign order next week to close Guantanamo prison

President-elect Barack Obama will sign an executive order in his first week in office that sets in motion the closure of the Guantanamo Bay military prison, the highest-profile symbol of the Bush administration's detention policies, two individuals familiar with Obama's thinking said on Monday. | 01/13/09 08:17:25 By - Jonathan S. Landay

Bush calls Coast Guardsman at Guantanamo to thank him

President-elect Barack Obama has vowed to close it. The international community has condemned it. On Christmas Eve, however, when it came time for him to wish some American service members a Merry Christmas for his last time in office, President George W. Bush rang up a North Carolina man who's assigned to the military prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. | 12/26/08 17:46:37 By - Carol Rosenberg and David Lightman

Gates orders development of plans to close Guantanamo

The Defense Department is drawing up plans to close the Guantanamo Bay military prison in anticipation that one of President-elect Barack Obama's first acts will be ordering the closure of the detention center associated with the abuse of terror suspects. | 12/18/08 19:52:28 By - Jonathan S. Landay and Margaret Talev

Some detained Yemenis guilty, some aren't, attorneys say

Attorneys for dozens of Yemenis held at Guantanamo Bay say that the prisoners range from "high-value" terrorism suspects to people who were mistakenly arrested, and they include a number who apparently were jailed because they're related to other suspects. | 12/18/08 20:01:38 By - Shashank Bengali

Obama detainees pledge raises concerns in South Carolina

South Carolina lawmakers are mobilizing against the possible transfer of terrorist suspects from the Guantanamo Bay military prison to the Charleston naval brig under President-elect Barack Obama's pledge to close the controversial U.S. facility in Cuba. | 12/18/08 20:04:03 By - James Rosen

Obama's biggest Guantanamo dilemma may lie in Yemen

Barack Obama has pledged to close the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. But he faces a major obstacle: Yemen. The largest group of prisoners still being held at Guantanamo are Yemenis. For them to go home, the Bush administration wants the Yemeni government to agree to keep them in jail. The Yemeni government has refused. Will Obama insist on the same? | 12/18/08 20:02:50 By - Shashank Bengali

Guantanamo jury sentences al Qaida video-maker to life

A military jury Monday convicted Osama bin Laden's media secretary of war crimes for creating an al Qaeda recruiting video that prosecutors argued incited suicide bombers. Within hours, the jury sentenced him to life in prison. | 12/18/08 20:03:13 By - Carol Rosenberg

Judge orders release of 5 Guantanamo detainees

A federal judge ordered the speedy release Thursday of five Algerian men held for nearly seven years in Guantanamo Bay prison. One of those ordered released is Lakhdar Boumediene, whose appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court became the underpinning of a 5-4 decision that gave Guantanamo prisoners the right to challenge their detention in court. | 12/18/08 20:02:26 By - Marisa Taylor

New Guantanamo chief judge warns of change with Obama

Army Col. James Pohl, who presided over the courts martial of several guards in the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal, was named the new chief judge for military commissions at Guantanamo on Monday. He warned participants there that while Obama might change military commissions, they need to remain focused on what they are doing for now. | 12/18/08 20:01:59 By - Carol Rosenberg

Senate probe blames top Bush officials for abuses

Former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld; Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and other top officials were responsible for the use of "abusive" interrogation techniques at Guantanamo Bay, in Afghanistan and at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, a bipartisan Senate report concluded Thursday. | 12/11/08 16:26:10 By - Roy Gutman and Jonathan S. Landay

Mohammed, four others offer confessions to 9/11 attacks

Confessed al Qaeda kingpin Khalid Sheik Mohammed and his four 9/11 accused co-plotters offered to plead guilty Monday to orchestrating the 9/11 attacks, a move that may leave President-elect Barack Obama to decide whether to execute them. | 12/08/08 10:43:20 By - Carol Rosenberg

Alleged 9/11 plotters at Guantanamo offer to plead guilty

Confessed al Qaeda kingpin Khalid Sheik Mohammed and his four 9/11 accused co-plotters offered to plead guilty Monday to orchestrating the 9/11 attacks, a move that may leave President-elect Barack Obama to decide whether to execute them. Four of the conspirators said the understood the import of a guilty plea. | 12/08/08 10:33:04 By - Carol Rosenberg

Closing Guantanamo a minefield of critical steps

The Pentagon on Monday begins more hearings for the proposed death penalty trial of reputed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed, even as President-elect Barack Obama's transition team and the Bush administration work to possibly close the Navy base prison camps. | 12/08/08 06:54:17 By - Carol Rosenberg

Bin Laden driver released from Guantanamo, headed home

The Pentagon early Tuesday morning sent Osama bin Laden's driver home to Yemen, a month before the first Guantanamo captive convicted of war crimes by a military jury completed his 66-month prison sentence. Salim Hamdan, 40, had been held prisoner by American forces for seven years. The Pentagon had argued that it could continue holding Hamdan even after his sentence expired Dec. 27. | 11/25/08 08:44:03 By - Carol Rosenberg

Guantanamo detainees get a dose of culture

Prison camp staff will soon start offering art and geology classes to long-held war-on-terrorism detainees. English is now being taught as military jailers tinker with how to distract captured jihadists. | 11/23/08 08:27:00 By - Carol Rosenberg

With Guantanamo war court in doubt, 9/11 case gets new judge

The military has assigned an Army colonel to take over the upcoming war crimes trial of alleged Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed, a sign that the Pentagon is plunging ahead with plans for military commissions of alleged 9/11 co-conspirators. | 11/18/08 16:10:20 By - Carol Rosenberg

Rights groups urge Obama to mount Guantanamo probe

The commission would systematically examine the U.S. treatment of detainees at Guantanamo and elsewhere since the 9/11 attacks. The groups made the recommendation as they released a two-year study of the impact of U.S. detention and interrogation practices on former captives that was similar to one McClatchy published earlier this year. | 11/12/08 18:09:51 By - Carol Rosenberg

Guantanamo down to 250 detainees; future uncertain

The Pentagon has sent two more Guantanamo detainees home to Algeria, reducing the prison camps' population to about 250. The latest transfer, announced on Monday, has been part of a steady series of departures from the controversial prison camps in southeast Cuba as the Bush administration winds down. | 11/11/08 12:43:18 By - Carol Rosenberg

Bin Laden propagandist convicted of war crimes

A military jury Monday convicted Osama bin Laden's media secretary of war crimes for creating an al Qaeda recruiting video that prosecutors argued incited suicide bombers. Ali Hamza al Bahlul, about 40, of Yemen, did not react as the guilty verdict was announced. The Army prosecutor asked the jurors to return the maximum, life in prison. The jury was to deliberate Bahlul's sentence Monday afternoon. | 11/03/08 17:29:22 By - Carol Rosenberg

Ex-U.S. jihadists testify at Guantanamo terror trial

A jailed ex-jihadist testified at the war court Thursday that, as an American al Qaeda recruit in Afghanistan, he was twice shown a two-hour propaganda film created by Osama bin Laden's media secretary — and was horror-struck. | 10/30/08 17:56:28 By - Carol Rosenberg

Guantanamo war court shows martyrdom video

Osama bin Laden's media secretary joined military jurors Wednesday watching his handiwork -- a crude two-hour recruiting video that spliced gory Muslim suffering with exhortations to holy war offered to prove the filmmaker committed war crimes. | 10/29/08 17:52:42 By - Carol Rosenberg

Guantanamo court judge: Threatening family was torture

In a first, a military judge ruled on Tuesday that a Guantanamo detainee's confession was extracted through torture, and excluded it from the trial of a young Afghan detainee at the war court. | 10/29/08 07:13:50 By - Carol Rosenberg

Guantanamo trial to showcase gadgetry, spy-plane imagery

An Army prosecutor on Tuesday described an alleged al Qaeda propagandist as being at the heart of the Afghan-based terror group by early 2000, a time when Osama bin Laden had decided to spread his message through media and mayhem. | 10/28/08 15:09:29 By - Carol Rosenberg

Pentagon drops charges against 5 held at Guantanamo

The Bush administration's top official overseeing military commissions has dismissed war crimes charges against five men at Guantanamo, a military commissions spokesman said Tuesday. The development followed the high-profile resignation of a prosecutor who'd protested plans to try a sixth man in the case. | 10/21/08 14:33:22 By - Carol Rosenberg

Florida welcome awaits Guantanamo prisoners from China

The Rev. Brant Copeland never heard of a Uighur before Guantanamo. Neither had Imam Naeem Harris, this city's Muslim spiritual leader. Nor had Rabbi Jack Romberg. Now the men have forged a community effort to settle three of the 17 Uighurs -- men from a Muslim minority in China -- whom a federal judge ruled were held for years in a legal limbo while mislabeled as enemies at the prison camps at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. | 10/17/08 14:56:03 By - Carol Rosenberg

Judge: Al Qaida accused to get laptops at Guantanamo

Guantanamo guards must furnish confessed al Qaeda kingpin Khalid Sheik Mohammed and his four alleged co-conspirators with enough battery power to use their prison camp laptops 12 hours a day -- but the 9/11 accused can't surf the Internet, a military judge ruled. | 10/13/08 07:05:27 By - Carol Rosenberg

No death penalty trial for alleged embassy bomber

A Pentagon appointee Friday spurned a prosecutor's request for a death penalty trial in approving war crimes charges against a former CIA-held captive at Guantanamo accused of a role in al Qaeda's 1998 East Africa embassies bombings. | 10/03/08 18:37:07 By - Carol Rosenberg

Prosecutors seek to reverse war court sentence

Pentagon prosecutors are asking a military judge to reverse himself and reassemble the jury that convicted Osama bin Laden's driver at Guantanamo, seeking to overturn a sentence that could make the first war court convict eligible for release by New Year's Eve. | 10/03/08 18:34:41 By - Carol Rosenberg

Army prosecutor quits Guantanamo war court case

An Army prosecutor has resigned from the Guantanamo war court in a crisis of conscience over plans to try a young Afghan accused of throwing a grenade rather than settle the case out of court, according to an affidavit filed with the court Wednesday. | 09/25/08 11:20:55 By - Carol Rosenberg

Alleged 9/11 architect: Guantanamo court an 'inquisition'

Confessed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed on Wednesday asked his military judge to disqualify himself from the terror trial, declaring, "In your eyes, I'm an Islamic extremist.'" Four of the five men accused in the complex conspiracy case joined in the request. | 09/24/08 15:39:17 By - Carol Rosenberg

Bin Laden's driver still a test case of sorts

It's been six weeks since a military jury made Salim Hamdan a war criminal for working as Osama bin Laden's $200-a-month driver in Afghanistan, and the Pentagon has yet to say precisely when his 66-month prison sentence ends. Or where he will go. | 09/23/08 09:06:42 By - Carol Rosenberg

Alleged 9/11 conspirator sparks war court standoff

Alleged 9/11 go-between Ramzi bin al Shibh refused to leave his prison camp cell Monday, triggering a clash on how to hold a pretrial hearing in the complex conspiracy case for which prosecutors seek the death penalty. | 09/22/08 11:44:32 By - Carol Rosenberg

Pentagon strips a general of his Guantanamo legal role

Air Force Brig. Gen. Thomas Hartmann had been disqualified from his role as impartial legal advisor at the trials by military judges who found that he had a pro-prosecution bias. Instead, Hartmann will be in charge of logistics for the war court. | 09/19/08 18:58:14 By - Carol Rosenberg

Canadian won't be tried at Guantanamo until after election

The Pentagon Tuesday announced a Nov. 10 war crimes trial date for alleged Canadian teen terrorist Omar Khadr, meaning the terror murder trial will follow both the U.S. and Canadian elections and likely straddle American Thanksgiving. | 09/16/08 14:46:15 By - Carol Rosenberg

Judge orders delay in Guantanamo trial of Canadian Omar Khadr

Canadian captive Omar Khadr's terror trial won't go forward as scheduled on Oct. 8, a military judge said Thursday. He did not set a new trial date. Army Col. Patrick Parrish disclosed the delay in pretrial hearings while attorneys at the war court argued over what evidence would be available to the defense at trial. At issue, in part, is whether the judge will order the government to fund and authorize independent mental health experts working for the defense to meet with Khadr at the prison camps. | 09/11/08 16:53:42 By - Carol Rosenberg

Why doesn't the public care about 9/11 war crimes trials?

Seven years ago today, the horrific hijackings united this nation in grief and determination. Now, despite four years of on-again, off-again Guantanamo war crimes tribunals designed to bring to justice the perpetrators of 9/11, there is little evidence that the trials resonate with victims' families or the American public. | 09/11/08 07:08:34 By - Carol Rosenberg

Former Pentagon official says Guantanamo adviser must go

Charles ''Cully'' Stimson, who was in charge of detainee affairs for the Pentagon, says the Pentagon's legal adviser on Guantanamo prosecutions, Air Force Brig. Gen. Thomas Hartmann, should be replaced because three military judges have now barred him from particiapting in Guantanamo cases, saying he's not objective. If Hartmann's not replaced, Stimson said, the process' fairness can be challenged. | 09/05/08 15:49:46 By - Carol Rosenberg

Pentagon adviser banned again from Guantanamo case

A military judge in the case of a Canadian captive at Guantanamo on Thursday again banned a general at the Pentagon from acting as a legal advisor because of a perception that he favors the prosecution. The judge said Air Force Brig. Gen. Thomas W. Hartmann appears to have lost his neutrality in his role as the Pentagon's legal advisor to military commissions. | 09/04/08 18:46:15 By - Carol Rosenberg

3 Guantanamo detainees sent to Afghanistan, Pakistan

The Pentagon sent three more war-on-terror captives home from Guantanamo this weekend -- two to Afghanistan and one to Pakistan, the Defense Department said Tuesday. | 09/02/08 12:52:55 By - Carol Rosenberg

Guantanamo gets ready for Hurricane Gustav

The U.S. military sent home two more war-on-terror detainees, both to Algeria, and canceled Red Cross visits to other prisoners Tuesday ahead of the arrival of Hurricane Gustav at the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. | 08/26/08 15:25:38 By - Carol Rosenberg

Alleged al Qaida PR man: Convict me next

An accused al Qaeda filmmaker with a flair for the dramatic set the stage for the first no-contest war crimes trial Friday by declaring a boycott until he is sentenced. ''It is a legal farce,'' Ali Hamza al Bahlul, 39, of Yemen, told his military judge, Air Force Col. Ronald Gregory. | 08/15/08 18:36:37 By - Carol Rosenberg

Judge bans general from Guantanamo trial role

For a second time, a military judge Thursday barred a U.S. general at the Pentagon from acting as a legal advisor in the trial of an accused terrorist at the Guantanamo war court. Moreover, Judge Stephen Henley ordered a new top-level review of the charges against Mohammed Jawad, about 23, who is accused of attempted murder for allegedly throwing a grenade as a teen that wounded two U.S. soldiers and their translator in a bazaar in Kabul, Afghanistan. | 08/14/08 13:59:24 By - Carol Rosenberg

Bin Laden driver's story to go Hollywood

It's true that a production company owned by Hollywood heartthrob George Clooney optioned the story of Osama bin Laden's driver. Hollywood publicist Stan Rosenfield told The Miami Herald by telephone Tuesday that Grant Heslov, who wrote "Good Night, and Good Luck" with Clooney, optioned a recently released book on the Hamdan case by New York writer Jonathan Mahler. | 08/13/08 15:23:12 By - Carol Rosenberg

Guantanamo general calls 2nd general 'bullying'

One general testified about another general at the war court Wednesday, describing a Pentagon official fast-tracking trials here as "abusive, bullying, unprofessional.'' Moreover, in testimony, Army Brig. Gen. Gregory Zanetti, deputy prison camps commander, described the approach employed earlier this year by his counterpart, Air Force Brig. Gen. Thomas Hartmann, this way: "Spray and pray. Charge everybody. Let's go. Speed, speed, speed.'' | 08/13/08 14:17:16 By - Carol Rosenberg

War court resumes, readies Canadian's trial

With one conviction by military jury on the books, the war court gavels back into session Wednesday with pre-trial hearings in the case of the next war-on-terror captive up for trial — Canadian Omar Khadr. Khadr, now 21, is accused of the grenade killing of a U.S. Special Forces soldier in a firefight in Afghanistan in July 2002, when he was 15. | 08/12/08 18:57:01 By - Carol Rosenberg

Bin Laden's driver gets light sentence, thanks military jury

In a stunning rebuke, a six-member U.S. military jury Thursday ignored a Pentagon prosecutor's plea for a 30 years-plus term and ordered Osama bin Laden's driver to 66 months in prison. With credit for time served given by the judge, that means Salim Hamdan, 40, of Yemen will be sent back to the general detainee population of Camp Delta by January, and eligible to return home. | 08/07/08 16:06:27 By - Carol Rosenberg

Pentagon seeks 30 years to life for bin Laden's driver

A Pentagon prosecutor Thursday cast Osama bin Laden's driver as "a hardened al Qaeda member" and asked the six-member U.S. military jury who convicted him of terrorism to lock him up for 30 years, if not for life. | 08/07/08 14:24:37 By -

9/11 victim can't speak at sentencing hearing

A military judge Wednesday spurned a Pentagon plan to have an FBI agent who was in New York on Sept. 11, 2001, testify as a victim at the sentencing hearing of Osama bin Laden's driver. Judge Keith Allred, a Navy captain, also ruled that Salim Hamdan, 37, was entitled to 61 months and seven days of credit to any sentence a jury of six military officers might issue. | 08/06/08 15:38:15 By - Carol Rosenberg

Guantanamo jury gives mixed verdict on Bin Laden's driver

Salim Hamdan was found guilty of lending material support to a terrorist organization. But the jury of military officers acquitted him of more serious charges that he had conspired with al Qaida leaders in a series of terrorist attacks. Hamdan, whose court case overturned the Bush administration's first military tribunal plan, is the first war-on-terror captive convicted by a military tribunal at Guantanamo. | 08/06/08 10:43:10 By - Carol Rosenberg

As Gitmo jury deliberates, driver phones home

While a military jury was deciding the fate of Osama bin Laden's driver, the accused got to phone his wife and kids in their native Yemen. The U.S. military granted Salim Hamdan, 37, a one-hour telephone call home on Monday evening, just as the five U.S. colonels and lieutenant colonels led by a Navy captain began considering the war crimes charges against him. | 08/05/08 19:25:36 By - Carol Rosenberg

Jury deliberates second day without verdict in driver's case

A military jury deliberated a second day without a verdict Tuesday in the case of Osama bin Laden's driver, Salim Hamdan, accused of 10 counts of conspiracy and providing material support for terrorism. The jury of six U.S. military officers has deliberated six and half hours across two days. The jury's president, a Navy captain, said they'd resume deliberations at 8:30 a.m. Wednesday. | 08/05/08 17:47:55 By - Carol Rosenberg

Military jury gets Guantanamo case of bin Laden's driver

A panel led by a U.S. Navy captain who's commanded a ship at sea began deliberating the case of Salim Hamdan, who faces life in prison if convicted of being an al Qaida terrorist. The other jury members are a female Army colonel, an Air Force colonel, a Marine lieutenant colonel and two Army lieutenant colonels, one of whom has flown Apache helicopters in Panama and Iraq. | 08/04/08 19:08:56 By - Carol Rosenberg

Defense rests in Guantanamo trial of bin Laden's driver

Confessed al Qaida kingpin Khalid Sheik Mohammed testified on paper Friday in the defense of Osama bin Laden's driver, saying he "was not a soldier, he was a driver. He was not fit to plan or execute. But he is fit to change trucks' tires, change oil filters, wash and clean cars and fasten cargo in pickup trucks." The six-man military jury will begin deliberations Monday. | 08/01/08 11:38:40 By - Carol Rosenberg

Agent: Driver pledged allegiance to bin Laden

In a key victory for the Pentagon prosecution, a federal agent was allowed to testify Thursday that Osama bin Laden's driver confessed to him here in 2003 that he had sworn a pledge of allegiance to his boss, the al Qaeda godfather. ''He said he pledged bayat to Osama bin Laden,'' Robert McFadden, an agent with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, said at the terror trial of the driver, Salim Hamdan, 37, of Yemen. | 07/31/08 19:33:40 By - Carol Rosenberg

Military commission takes secret testimony at trial

The military commission hearing the first U.S. war crimes tribunal since World War II took secret testimony on Thursday, a first. Defense lawyers called U.S. Army psychologist Col. L. Morgan Banks III to testify, then all sides agreed that what he was about to say at the trial of Osama bin Laden's driver was secret. So reporters were ushered out of the commissions room, as were observers from the American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights Watch. | 07/31/08 18:23:02 By - Carol Rosenberg

Alleged 9/11 mastermind refuses to testify at driver's trial

Reputed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed has balked at testifying in person at the trial of Osama bin Laden's driver, defense lawyers said Wednesday. Instead, the jury will get written statements from the al Qaeda kingpin and another alleged plotter in the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks. | 07/30/08 19:33:09 By - Carol Rosenberg

Driver doesn't fit terrorist profile, expert witness says

Al Qaeda terrorists are the elite of Osama bin Laden's followers, gifted linguists with college degrees plucked from paramilitary training camps — and don't fit the profile of a Yemeni truck driver with a fourth-grade education, a defense witness testified Wednesday. ''I don't see Salim Hamdan by any stretch of the imagination fitting this profile,'' said Brian Glyn Williams, in live video testimony beamed from the U.S. air base at Incirlik, Turkey. | 07/30/08 18:57:14 By - Carol Rosenberg

Driver told FBI agents U.S. could have killed bin Laden

In his seventh of month of U.S. captivity, Osama bin Laden's driver told a pair of FBI agents that it was America's fault that the al Qaida leader was still alive. The message was, ''You had these opportunities, America. You didn't do anything,'' FBI agent George Crouch Jr. testified Friday at Salim Hamdan's war crimes trial. | 07/25/08 18:15:05 By - Carol Rosenberg

Court orders Bush administration to preserve possible evidence of torture

A federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., issued a preliminary order on Tuesday directing the Bush administration to preserve any evidence that might show that a former Baltimore resident was tortured during his three years in secret CIA detention. | 07/25/08 16:04:42 By - Carol Rosenberg

Guantanamo detainee asks court to declare that he was tortured

In a filing made public Friday, lawyers for a Guantanamo detainee have asked a federal court to examine the way he was questioned while in secret CIA custody for three years and decide whether he was tortured. | 07/25/08 16:04:18 By - Carol Rosenberg

Bin Laden's driver wins another trial delay

A military commission judge Friday delayed the scheduled trial of Osama bin Laden's driver until after the U.S. Supreme Court has decided another key detainee case.Navy Capt. Keith Allred said delaying the start of Salim Hamdan's trial until July 21 "avoids the potential embarrassment, waste of resources and prejudice to the accused that would" result were the Bush administration to lose the Supreme Court case. | 07/25/08 16:03:16 By - Carol Rosenberg

Pentagon sets trial date for one Guantanamo detainee, charges another

A military judge declared Osama bin Laden's former driver an "unlawful enemy combatant" in a ruling released Thursday, clearing the way the driver to be tried on war crimes charges in May before a military commission at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. | 07/25/08 15:08:15 By - Carol Rosenberg

9/11 Guantanamo trials unlikely before Bush leaves office

The U.S. military is scrambling to assemble defense teams for six Guantanamo detainees who are facing the death penalty for their alleged roles in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people. Knowledgeable legal experts, however, said it's unlikely that they can be tried speedily, meaning the cases probably won't be heard before the Bush administration leaves office next January. | 07/25/08 15:07:40 By - Carol Rosenberg and Nancy A. Youssef

Bush allows terror detainees some rights under Geneva Convention

In a major reversal of a keystone policy in its war on terrorism, the Bush administration announced Tuesday that all detainees in U.S. military custody, including those at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, are entitled to Geneva Convention protections that prohibit humiliating treatment and torture. The change reflects the Pentagons response to the Supreme Courts 5-3 decision last month that struck down the administrations makeshift formula for military tribunals at Guantanamo, declaring their procedures unconstitutional and a violation of Geneva Convention obligations. The two-page Pentagon memo repudiates a core element of the legal foundation of President Bushs approach to dealing with terrorism. Bush and his legal advisers initially had said the Geneva Conventions didnt apply to the war on terrorism because it was a new type of conflict that demanded more aggressive action. | 07/25/08 15:07:13 By - Carol Rosenberg and Margaret Talev

Supreme Court ruling could free scores from Guantanamo

Within hours of the court's decision granting Guantanamo detainees access to federal courts, attorneys were preparing to demand hearings for detainees long held without charges. These hearings will force the Bush administration to reveal its evidence and expose publicly how the detainees have been treated. Some attorneys think that the administration simply will start releasing detainees to avoid the potentially embarrassing hearings altogether. | 07/25/08 15:06:30 By - Michael Doyle and Carol Rosenberg

Bush lawyers told to speed Guantanamo detention appeals

A federal judge told Justice Department lawyers to give the cases of Guantanamo detainees appealing their imprisonment priority over all other cases. U.S. District Court Judge Thomas Hogan made the admonition at the first hearing since the Supreme Court ruled last month that the detainees had the right to challenge their imprisonment in court. | 07/25/08 15:05:09 By - Marisa Taylor

General who probed Abu Ghraib says Bush officials committed war crimes

"There is no longer any doubt as to whether the current administration has committed war crimes," retired Army Major Gen. Antonio Taguba wrote in a new report on medical evidence that U.S. troops abused prisoners in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo. "The only question that remains to be answered is whether those who ordered the use of torture will be held to account." | 07/25/08 15:04:48 By - Warren P. Strobel