WASHINGTON — U.S. military officials held secret administrative hearings at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for at least three terrorism suspects, including two alleged planners of the Sept. 11 attacks, a first step in determining whether they should be tried before a military commission.
Pentagon spokesmen announced that a combatant status review tribunal hearing for Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, perhaps the most well-known Al Qaeda suspect in U.S. custody, was held Saturday. On Friday, the military held hearings for Abu Faraj Libbi and Ramzi Binalshibh. A fourth hearing for an unspecified suspect was to have been held Monday.
A combatant status review tribunal determines whether a detainee is an "enemy combatant." Once foreign detainees are so classified, they may be charged and tried before a military commission.
U.S. officials have accused Mohammed of planning the Sept. 11 attacks with the help of Binalshibh. A Kuwaiti-born militant of Pakistani descent, Mohammed claimed to have brought the idea for a multi-plane suicide hijacking plot to Al Qaeda in the mid-1990s after a similar scheme was thwarted by Philippine authorities, U.S. officials have said. After the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Mohammed became Al Qaeda's operational commander, overseeing several attacks before his capture in Pakistan in March 2003.
Libbi, a Libyan, reportedly succeeded Mohammed as the No. 3 leader of Al Qaeda. The most wanted man in Pakistan at one time, he allegedly masterminded two attempts to assassinate Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf.
Bryan Whitman, a Pentagon spokesman, announced Monday that one of the three suspects did not attend his hearing, but defense officials would not say who attended the hearings, and who refused. Detainees are not required to attend.
There are about 385 detainees being held at Guantanamo.
Mohammed, Libbi and Binalshibh were among 14 detainees transferred last year from CIA custody to the U.S.-run detention center at Guantanamo. The Pentagon announced this month that hearings for the 14 would be held over the next few weeks.
The Pentagon began holding the review tribunals in July 2004, as the result of a Supreme Court decision. Most detainees are designated as enemy combatants before they are formally charged with crimes. But the review tribunals themselves are considered administrative procedures and the detainees are not allowed lawyers. Instead, each is provided a military "personal representative" who assists in preparing his case.
