The practice, which simulates drowning to the verge of death, has been condemned worldwide.
None of the trials could be completed before a new president is inaugurated, and both Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain have said they want to close the Guantanamo Bay prison and war crimes court.
"My hope would be that this doesn't survive the election and we recognize the commissions process for what it is: a historical aberration and an embarrassment that should be put behind us as soon as possible," said Army Lt. Col. Bryan Broyles, a defense lawyer for Qahtani.
Even former administration officials have looked askance at the moves of tribunal administrators.
"One of the purposes of the commissions is to convince the world and the American public that there are bad people at Guantanamo and that Al Qaeda is a discredited organization," said Vijay Padmanabhan, a former State Department lawyer responsible for detainee affairs who now teaches the law of war at Yeshiva University in New York.
"When you announce charges and cancel them without explanation, you undermine your ultimate goal."
Binyam Mohammed's lawyer, human rights activist Clive Stafford Smith, said the dropped charges were deceptive.
"Military prosecutors have told us that they are going to refile charges in about 30 days," Stafford Smith said.
He speculated that prosecutors wanted to prevent Vandeveld from being subpoenaed to testify about the withholding of evidence.
"What they're trying to do is neutralize his ability to be called as a witness," Stafford Smith said.
Human rights advocates pointed to the dismissed charges as further evidence of Guantanamo Bay's dysfunction and its denial of due process.
"The implosion of these five prosecutions painfully underscores how the Bush administration's torture and detention policies have failed to render justice in any sense of the word," said Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union.
--
carol.williams@latimes.com
