WASHINGTON — Over the years, the Pentagon has sworn out military commission charges against 26 detainees at Guantanamo. Here's how those cases stand after Attorney General Eric Holder's announcement that five 9/11 conspirators will be prosecuted in civilian court in New York.
CONVICTED
Three detainees — so-called Australian Taliban David Hicks, Osama bin Laden's former driver, Salim Ahmed Hamdan of Yemen, and Al Qaida media secretary Ali Hamza al Bahlul — have been convicted of war crimes, Hicks in a plea deal that sent him home to serve out his sentence. Both Hicks and Hamdan are now free in their home countries; Bahlul was sentenced to life in prison and is the only convicted war criminal at Guantanamo, segregated from the other prisoners.
9/11 CONSPIRATORSSix detainees were alleged to be 9/11 conspirators. Five of them, all former CIA detainees, will now face trial in New York. The military dropped charges against the sixth, Mohammed al Qahtani, a Saudi, in November 2008 after Pentagon official Susan Crawford, who must approve all military commission prosecutions, determined that Qahtani had been tortured in Guantanamo and could not be tried. Holder did not mention Qahtani on Friday and his fate was unclear.
Another detainee, Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani, accused as a co-conspirator in the 1998 East Africa U.S. Embassies bombings, was transferred to New York earlier this year for a federal trial.
DISMISSED CASESThe U.S. withdrew charges against another detainee, Mohammed Jawad, accused of throwing a grenade that wounded two U.S. soldiers and their translator in Kabul, after a military judge ruled that his case was built on a tortured confession extracted by Afghan police before his transfer to Guantanamo. Jawad returned home in September after a U.S. District Judge in Washington, D.C. ordered his release.
Charges of supporting al Qaida were dropped early this year against Binyam Mohamed, an Ethiopian who lived in Great Britain, after the Obama administration agreed to return him to Great Britain.
Another detainee, Fouad al Rabia, accused of being Osama bin Laden's logistics officer at the battle of Tora Bora, is now awaiting repatriation to his native Kuwait in Camp Iguana, a segregation site at Guantanamo for detainees who've been ordered released by federal judges in Washington D.C. The military commission charges against him are still pending, but the move to Camp Iguana is tacit acknowledgement that he will be released. UPDATE:Rabia was flown to Kuwait on Dec. 9, 2009.
HEADED FOR TRIALIn addition to the five Holder named Friday as authorized for trials by military commission _ Ibrahim al Qosi of Sudan, Omar Khadr of Canada, Ahmed al Darbi of Saudi Arabia, Noor Uthman Mohammed of Sudan and Abd al Rahim al Nashiri of Yemen -- a sixth detainee, Mohammed Kamin of Afghanistan, has a pre-trial hearing set for Wednesday. Kamin is accused of a single charge, providing material support for terror, for allegedly supporting al Qaida and planting mines in Afghanistan.
INITIAL CHARGES FILEDSeven detainees have had charges sworn out against them, but those charges have not yet been approved by Crawford, the Pentagon so-called convening authority. Until that step is taken, they cannot go before a military judge for arraignment and eventual trial.
Those detainees are:
Mohamed Hashim, accused of spying in Afghanistan for al Qaida;
Obaidullah of Afghanistan, charged with possessing anti-tank mines in Afghanistan;
Faiz Mohammed Ahmed al Kandari of Kuwait, charged with supporting al Qaida by attending a training camp and producing recruiting tapes;
Tarek Mahmoud El Sawah of Egypt, charged with being an al Qaida trainer;
Jabran Said Bin al Qahtani of Saudi , accused of undergoing al Qaida training and plotting to plant road side charges in Afghanistan
Sufyian Barhoumi of Algeria, charged in the same conspiracy as Qahtani.
Ghassan Abdullah al Sharbi of Algeria, charged in the same conspiracy as Qahtani
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