[NYTr] Charges reinstated against Canadian in Gitmo Gulag

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

sent by MichaelP (activ-l)

[U$ military Appeals Court doesn't give a fig for international law.-M]

Reuters - Sep 25, 2007
http://uk.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUKN2433210620070925?rpc=401&

Charges reinstated against Canadian in Guantanamo

By JoAnne Allen

WASHINGTON  (Reuters)  -  A  U.S.  military  appeals  court  on Monday 
reinstated  terrorism  charges against a Canadian prisoner held at the 
Guantanamo Bay prison camp for more than five years.

The  U.S.  Court  of  Military Commission Review ruled that a military 
judge  was  wrong in dismissing the charges against Omar Khadr because
of questions over the detainee's "enemy combatant" status.

Khadr,  21,  is accused of killing one U.S. soldier with a grenade and 
wounding  another  during a firefight at a suspected al Qaeda compound
in Afghanistan in 2002.

A military tribunal judge, Army Col. Peter Brownback, dismissed murder
and conspiracy charges against Khadr on June 4. He said the case could
not proceed  because Khadr had not been designated an "unlawful enemy 
combatant,"  as  required  under the 2006 law that authorized military 
tribunals for foreign terrorism suspects.

Military prosecutors appealed Brownback's decision, arguing that Khadr
had been  declared an "enemy combatant," and that was essentially the
same as "unlawful enemy combatant."

Brownback  insisted the difference between an "enemy combatant" and an 
"unlawful  enemy  combatant"  is  critical  because  international law 
requires  other  types  of  trial for captive considered "lawful enemy 
combatants."

The  appeals  court  agreed  with  the  prosecutors,  concluding  that 
Brownback erred in his ruling.

"Without   any   determination   of   lawful   or   unlawful   status, 
classification  as  an  'enemy  combatant'  is sufficient to justify a 
detaining  power's  continuing  detention of an individual captured in 
battle," the appeals court said in a 25-page ruling.