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U.S. military charges Australian Guantanamo detainee Kristin Roberts The U.S military has charged Australia's only Guantanamo Bay detainee with providing material support for terrorism, and legal proceedings will begin in about a month, the Pentagon said on Thursday. The charges against David Hicks are the first brought against a suspected al Qaeda or Taliban member under the military commissions law passed by the U.S. Congress last year, the Pentagon said. Australian Prime Minister John Howard, facing a tough election in 2007, had demanded Hicks be charged by the end of February and pressed Washington for a speedy trial. Hicks, 31, who has been in U.S. custody at the Guantanamo military prison for five years, will be notified of the charges this week, a Pentagon spokesman said. Once notified, he will be arraigned within 30 days and then a military judge will have 120 days to form the military commission. The U.S. military accuses Hicks of supporting terrorism by attending al Qaeda training courses, conducting surveillance on the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, and briefly fighting U.S. and coalition forces in Afghanistan. A second charge of "attempted murder" was not advanced. An attorney for Hicks said the charge of providing material support has never existed in the laws of war and that his client had "no hope" of getting a fair trial. "All this time, we have been told that David had to be tried by military commission rather than in a federal court because the offenses were war crimes," said U.S. Marine Corps Maj. Michael Mori, defense counsel in the Pentagon's military commissions office. "But after five years, the U.S. has not charged David with a single war crime." "After 5 years in Guantanamo, David has no hope of facing a fair trial, which would have been provided to an American a long time ago," Mori said. AFGHANISTAN CHARGES The Pentagon appoints U.S. military lawyers to detainees facing charges at Guantanamo. The military charges that Hicks took part in operations against coalition forces during the early stages of the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan in October 2001. He guarded a tank outside of Kandahar airport for a week and while there trained others, according to the charges. Hicks then moved to Kabul and Kunduz, looking for combat opportunities, the U.S. military said. In Kunduz, he joined for two hours a group of al Qaeda and Taliban members fighting U.S. and coalition forces, according to the documents. The next day, Kunduz fell to U.S. forces and Hicks fled, the military said. Hicks was captured in Afghanistan by Northern Alliance forces while trying to reach Pakistan, the documents stated. The United States has been criticized worldwide for the continued detention at Guantanamo Bay of people the Pentagon says are al Qaeda and Taliban members. Many have been held for more than four years without charges. The Pentagon on Thursday said it transferred five detainees to Afghanistan and Tajikistan, bringing the number of remaining detainees to 385. Pentagon spokesman Lt. Cmdr. Jeff Gordon called the military commission proceedings against Hicks "an important milestone". Congress passed the law creating military commissions after the Supreme Court ruled the Bush administration lacked legislative authority to try terrorism suspects under the tribunal system first proposed. Under the commissions system, hearsay and classified evidence is allowed at a judge's discretion, but not statements obtained through torture. The law also stripped detainees of the ability to challenge detentions in the U.S. court system. ---------------------------------------------------
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