Khalid Shaikh Mohammed

Military attorneys for confessed Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and four alleged co-conspirators called Friday for the dismissal of the charges against the men, saying an Air Force general advising the tribunals applied "unlawful influence" to bring them to trial. The defense motion followed Navy Capt. Keith J. Allred's ruling last week that disqualified Brig. Gen. Thomas W. Hartmann from the case against Salid Ahmed Hamdan, Osama bin Laden's former driver.

They make an unlikely pair, the world's most notorious captured terrorist and the Navy captain assigned to defend him against war-crimes charges that could lead to his execution. But together, the two men are quietly embarking on a legal odyssey that could last years, and may ultimately help define the constitutional parameters of the United States' role in the global war on terrorism.

As Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and his four codefendants made their first court appearance to face charges in the Sept. 11 attacks, journalists watched from behind a soundproof glass wall and listened to an audio feed with a 20-second delay. The tribunal's chief judge ordered the delay in the audio to guard against any accidental disclosure of classified information as the terrorism suspects face prosecution. Marine Col. Ralph H.

Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the Kuwaiti national who is thought to be the highest-ranking Al Qaeda operative in U.S. custody, told a military tribunal in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, last weekend that he was responsible for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, according to a transcript of the hearing.

IT'S NOT NEWS THAT Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks or that he was involved in other terrorist conspiracies. It was precisely because of his central role in Al Qaeda that he was hunted down and captured in Pakistan four years ago and subjected to harsh interrogation.

The most revealing aspect of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed's testimony before a military tribunal may not have been the details about the many Al Qaeda plots he claims to have orchestrated but the insight it offered into the suspected Sept. 11 mastermind. In an hourlong written and oral presentation to his military captors Saturday, Mohammed showed himself to be ambitious, boastful and, when given the chance, talkative. He was even thoughtful about his cause and his craft.

Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the confessed planner of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, admitted during a military tribunal last weekend that he killed Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, according to a revised transcript of the hearing that confirmed long-held suspicions about his role in the slaying. The Al Qaeda operative said he cut off Pearl's head after the journalist was kidnapped on a reporting trip to Pakistan in 2002.

IN "Silver Blaze," one of the most popular of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's celebrated Sherlock Holmes stories, the following exchange occurs between the great detective and an Inspector Gregory of Scotland Yard: Gregory: "Is there any other point to which you would wish to draw my attention?" Holmes: "To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time." Gregory: "The dog did nothing in the night-time." Holmes: "That was the curious incident."

Two senators who watched Khalid Shaikh Mohammed confess to planning the Sept. 11 attacks and other plots said that his allegations of mistreatment by U.S. captors should be taken seriously. "To do otherwise would reflect poorly on our nation," Sens. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said in a joint statement. Mohammed gave military officials a written statement alleging mistreatment before arriving at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

The lawyer for a man convicted of killing Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl said in Pakistan that he would appeal his client's death sentence after reports that an Al Qaeda lieutenant recently confessed to the slaying. Khalid Shaikh Mohammed claimed at a U.S. military hearing at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, that he personally beheaded Pearl in 2002. An anti-terrorism court sentenced Ahmad Omar Saeed Sheikh, a British-born militant, to death for involvement in Pearl's killing.