MIAMI, May 13: A US judge on Friday suspended the Guantanamo war crimes tribunal of a Saudi prisoner until after the Supreme Court rules next month on the tribunals’ legality.
The Saudi captive, Ghassan al Sharbi, is one of 10 Guantanamo detainees charged with conspiracy to commit war crimes and the fourth to have his case delayed pending the Supreme Court ruling that is expected next month.
He had been scheduled to appear before a tribunal for pre-trial hearings next week at the US naval base in Cuba.
In Washington, District Judge Emmet Sullivan ruled that Ghassan Sharbi could suffer irreparable harm if he appeared before a tribunal that could be deemed illegal within a month.
He said the Justice Department had failed to prove its claim that delaying the tribunal ‘would imperil the war effort’.
President George Bush created the military tribunals after the Sept 11 attacks to try foreign citizens on terrorism charges.
Attorneys for another Guantanamo defendant argued before the Supreme Court in March that the tribunals are unconstitutional because they allow the president, through his military subordinates, to define the crime, choose the prosecutor and judges and set all the rules.
Mr Sharbi, a U.S.-trained electrical engineer, testified at his first tribunal hearing last month that he fought against the United States, was proud of it and was willing to spend the rest of his life in prison as ‘a matter of honour’.
He was captured in Pakistan in 2002 and is accused of being part of an Al Qaeda cell assigned to build car-bomb detonators for use against US troops in Afghanistan. He and the other tribunal defendants would face life in prison if convicted.—Reuters
