Guilty plea to speed 9/11 cases
Pakistani agrees to testify against other terrorists
US NAVAL BASE AT GUANTANAMO BAY, CUBA – Pakistani national Majid Khan pleaded guilty Wednesday at a Guantanamo military tribunal in a landmark case that could speed the trials of Sept. 11 suspects.
Khan, 32, a protegé of Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, pleaded guilty to conspiracy, murder and attempted murder in violation of the laws of war, and to material support for terrorism and espionage.
Dressed in a dark suit and pink tie, he denied he ever met or spoke to slain al-qaida leader Osama bin Laden but admitting to taking part in a “conspiracy” in Pakistan, Thailand and Indonesia.
Khan, who has spent the last nine years behind bars, faced possible life in prison but will receive a reduced sentence of no more than 25 years as part of a plea agreement that requires him to co-operate with U.S. authorities.
He will testify against other “high value” detainees, including Mohammed and four others alleged to have taken part in the 2001 attacks.
To insure he fulfils his side of the bargain, the sentence will not be handed down for four years, until Feb. 29, 2016.
Khan told Judge James Pohl he understood the terms of the plea deal.
It is the first plea bargain among 14 Guantanamo detainees the U.S. military classifies as “high value.”
More than 10 years after the attacks, Mohammed and four co-defendants accused of plotting the strikes are still awaiting trial at the prison, part of a U.S. naval base in Cuba.
At Wednesday’s hearing, Pohl rejected a defence request that the terms of the plea agreement be kept secret for security reasons, saying “the nature of plea and the nature of information are already in the public domain.”
Khan is accused of working under Khalid Sheikh Mohammed’s direction to plan explosions of fuel tanks at U.S. gasoline stations and an attempted assassination of for mer Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf.
He is also accused of delivering funds for a bomb attack at a Marriott hotel in Jakarta, Indonesia, that killed 11 people in August 2003.
Khan lived in the United States for seven years before his arrest in Pakistan in 2003.
“If Khan provides information on KSM and others, as has been suggested was part of the deal, it will no doubt speed up the prosecutions,” said Karen Greenberg, a terrorism expert at Fordham Law School, referring to Mohammed, who had been scheduled to be arraigned earlier this month.
Such testimony, she said, “will break through the barriers presented by evidence obtained through torture, as this information will be presented in the present time and in a legal proceeding.”
Over the years, 779 inmates have been detained at Guantanamo, most without charge or trial.
Most have been transferred to their home countries or third countries in recent years and released.