28 March 2004	Sunday	06 Safar 1425

TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE, March 27: The Air Force can bar a Syrian-born US airman accused of espionage from speaking his native Arabic, a military judge ruled on Friday.

Ahmad Al Halabi, 25, has been charged with spying and misuse of classified information while a translator at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the military base where the United States maintains a prison camp for suspected Al Qaeda and Taliban fighters.

Since last summer, the military has instructed Halabi not to speak Arabic, an order that bars him from direct communication with his parents and fiance, who do not speak English.

"I also have a fiance and my relationship may collapse due to lack of communications," Halabi wrote in a filing made public this week.

Judge Col Barbara Brand ruled however that all prisoners at Vandenberg Air Force base face the same restriction so Halabi was not being singled out for punishment. But she ordered the US government to find a way to allow the airman to communicate with his family twice a month or explain why they could not accommodate that request.

Sgt James Douglass, an officer in charge of confinement at the military prison where Halabi has been held, told the court military base detainees are routinely barred from speaking languages other than English.

"It relates to our ability to monitor what he is saying at all times. We would not know if he was speaking about the case if he was speaking Arabic," Douglass said.

Civilian defence attorney Donald Rehkopf, who has specialized in defending military personnel for 28 years, said he never had run into such a severe restriction on language.

In the third day on pretrial motions at Travis Air Base 50 miles north of San Francisco, Brand also rejected a defence motion to release Halabi from pretrial detention. She said there was still a flight risk and possibility of misconduct.-Reuters