4th Detainee to Face Trial by Tribunal

A Yemeni man who once served as Osama bin Laden’s personal driver has been ordered to stand trial by a military commission on charges of murder, terrorism and conspiracy to attack civilians, the Pentagon said Wednesday.

Salim Ahmed Salim Hamdan became the fourth detainee at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, named to go before a tribunal, which President Bush authorized for foreign nationals facing terrorism counts after the Sept. 11 attacks. No trial date has been set.

According to the charge sheet released by the Pentagon, Hamdan served as Bin Laden’s bodyguard and personal driver from the time the two met in 1996 until November 2001, when Hamdan was captured and sent to the detention center at Guantanamo Bay.

During that time, according to U.S. officials, Hamdan delivered weapons and ammunition to Al Qaeda members, received handgun and machine gun training at an Al Qaeda training base in Afghanistan and shuttled Bin Laden around Afghanistan as the Al Qaeda chief planned the 1998 attacks against the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

“During these trips, Osama bin Laden would give speeches in which he would encourage others to conduct ‘martyr missions’ (meaning an attack wherein one would kill himself as well as the targets of the attack) against the Americans, to engage in war against the Americans, and to drive the ‘infidels’ out of the Arabian Peninsula,” the charge sheet said.

Navy Lt. Cmdr. Charles Swift, Hamdan’s lawyer, and other attorneys have filed a federal lawsuit in U.S. district court in Seattle attacking the tribunals as an “unprecedented, unconstitutional, and dangerously unchecked expansion of executive authority.”

Swift is in Yemen investigating the case and could not be reached for comment. In previous interviews, Swift has acknowledged that his client was Bin Laden’s driver, but says he never participated in any terrorist activities. The Pentagon charge sheet does not implicate Hamdan in the planning or execution of any terrorist attacks.

The lead counsel in the Seattle case, however, said that charging Hamdan now, after 2 1/2 years in U.S. custody, is yet another instance of how the military tribunal process violates the tenets of U.S. military justice.

“Military law requires charges to be brought within 90 days of confinement. We are well, well past that point,” said Neal K. Katyal, a law professor at Georgetown University who is representing Swift and other military lawyers in the federal case. “This is a further example of the reckless disregard with which the Pentagon has treated the military justice system.”

Katyal also criticized that the Pentagon for deciding to officially charge Hamdan while his lawyer, Swift, was out of the country.

In addition to the four detainees officially charged, the Pentagon has identified 11 other men as potential defendants for military tribunals. The three other Guantanamo Bay detainees currently facing tribunals are David Hicks of Australia, Ali Hamza Ahamad Sulayman al Bahlul of Yemen and Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud al Qosi of Sudan.