Conviction
Guantánamo detainee pleads guilty in terror case
A Guantánamo Bay detainee on Wednesday pleaded guilty to conspiring with Al Qaeda and to providing material support for terrorism, setting up the first conviction before a military commission under the Obama administration.
The detainee, Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud al-Qosi, a 50-year-old Sudanese man captured in Afghanistan, admitted to a military judge that he had engaged in hostilities against the United States in violation of the laws of war.
A jury of military officers next month will determine his prison sentence, which will be constrained by terms of a plea agreement that remains under seal for now, said Capt. David Iglesias of the Navy, a prosecutor and spokesman for the commissions.
"This represents progress in our country's ongoing struggle against terrorism," said Captain Iglesias, who was in Guantánamo Bay in Cuba. "We've got someone who admitted under oath to some pretty serious violations under the laws of war."
In an e-mail exchange, Paul Reichler, a civilian lawyer who is helping to defend Mr. Qosi, declined to comment.
At the hearing, Mr. Qosi acknowledged following the Qaeda leader, Osama bin Laden, from Sudan to Afghanistan in 1996 and serving variously as a quartermaster, cook, bodyguard and driver at Qaeda compounds.
After the Sept. 11 attacks, and the invasion of Afghanistan, Mr. Qosi was captured by Pakistani forces in the Tora Bora mountains in December 2001, turned over to the United States and taken to Guantánamo.
While his role in Al Qaeda was relatively low-profile compared with the accusations against several other detainees, Mr. Qosi's case is significant because he is the first prisoner convicted of war crimes by a military commission under President Obama.
As a candidate, Mr. Obama criticized the commissions system established by President George W. Bush, and one of Mr. Obama's first acts was to suspend the trials. His administration later worked with Congress to overhaul the rules, and it defends the revamped system as fair, although the American Civil Liberties Union contends that they remain flawed.
Still, the inclusion of the "material support for terrorism" charge in Mr. Qosi's case was notable because David Kris, the assistant attorney general for national security, told Congress last year that it would be a mistake to include such an offense in the commissions system.
Mr. Kris testified that because the offense was not generally considered to be part of the traditional laws of war, its use could make convictions vulnerable to reversal and could undermine the system's legitimacy.
Nevertheless, Congress kept the offense in its 2009 legislation overhauling the commissions.
Mr. Iglesias said prosecutors used the charge against Mr. Qosi because it was in the law Congress had approved. He also noted that Mr. Qosi had in essence waived his right to appeal on the grounds that providing material support to terrorism is not a valid offense under the laws of war.
"You waive your right to appeal a specific argument by pleading guilty, and he pled guilty to material support," he said. "We don't expect there to be any appeal."
Mr. Qosi's guilty plea made him the fourth detainee to be convicted by a military commission since Mr. Bush ordered their creation in November 2001.
In March 2007 and August 2008, respectively, David Hicks of Australia and Salim Hamdan of Yemen pleaded guilty to providing material support for terrorism. Both received short prison terms and are now free.
In November 2008, Ali Hamza al-Bahlul, a Yemeni accused of making propaganda videos for Al Qaeda, was convicted on several charges after he refused to mount a defense. He received a life sentence.
Although the Bush administration established the military commissions system with an eye toward providing flexible trial rules and swift convictions, the system has had a rocky history.
It took years to develop rules for the new system, and the first charges against a group of detainees, Mr. Qosi among them, were not filed until 2004. The trials became bogged down in legal challenges culminating in a 2006 Supreme Court decision, in a case brought by Mr. Hamdan, striking down the system. Lawmakers have since passed legislation twice overhauling it.
Also Wednesday, Germany announced that it would accept two detainees who had been cleared for release but could not be repatriated for their own safety. Their identities were not disclosed.
(Published by The New York Times – July 7, 2010)