From the Los Angeles Times

Five suspects in 9/11 attacks referred to trial

The Pentagon's war crimes tribunal approves pursuing death penalty charges against five of six alleged conspirators in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, including Khalid Shaikh Mohammed.

By Carol J. Williams
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

11:34 AM PDT, May 13, 2008

The head of the Pentagon's war crimes tribunal today approved pursuing death penalty charges against five alleged Sept. 11 conspirators, including confessed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed.

Prosecution of a sixth suspect, so-called 20th hijacker Mohammed Qahtani, was dropped.

The tribunal's convening authority, Susan J. Crawford, referred to trial the cases against Mohammed and alleged top Al Qaeda collaborators Walid bin Attash, Ramzi Binalshibh, Ali Abdul Aziz Ali and Mustafa Ahmed Hawsawi. The men are being held at a maximum-security prison at the U.S. Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Under rules of the Military Commissions Act of 2006, the defendants must be arraigned within 30 days of the referral of charges and trial begun within four months.

The arraignments, at the high-security Guantanamo war crimes court, will be the first public appearance of the men since their captures in the years after the attacks. They are accused of plotting the 2001 attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a crash site in Pennsylvania.

Crawford noted that the charges sworn out against Qahtani in February were dismissed "without prejudice," meaning that the Pentagon could reinstate them later.

Mohammed, known in intelligence circles as KSM, and the four others each face trial for alleged conspiracy, murder in violation of the laws of war, attacking civilians, attacking civilian objects, intentionally causing serious bodily injury, destruction of property, terrorism and material support for terrorism.

All but Hawsawi are also charged with hijacking aircraft for their alleged roles in preparing the attacks.

Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, which has offered to help defend the so-called high-value detainees at Guantanamo, accused the government of dragging its feet on the civil rights attorneys' security clearances.

He also speculated that charges were dropped against Qahtani because FBI interrogators had been unable to extract a confession from him without coercive techniques that may not be allowed as evidence at trial.