No reporters at detainees’ hearings
The Pentagon said Tuesday that it would bar news coverage of hearings for the 14 suspected terrorists transferred to Guantanamo Bay last fall from secret CIA prisons abroad, including an alleged mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks.
The first hearing will be Friday, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said. He would not say which of the 14 would be first.
The hearings, which the Pentagon calls combatant status review tribunals, are meant to determine whether a prisoner is an “enemy combatant.” Enemy combatants can be designated as eligible for a military trial, the first of which is expected this summer.
Coverage of previous combatant status review tribunals -- of which there were more than 550 between July 2004 and March 2005 -- was not prohibited, although there were restrictions.
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