:: NEWS COCKTAIL aka BlahBlahBlog ::
"Everything is being compressed into tiny tablets. You take a little pill of news every day - 23 minutes - and that's supposed to be enough." -Walter Cronkite, RE TV news. The Web has changed that for many, however, and here is an extra dose for your daily news cocktail. This prescription tends to include surveillance and now war-related links, along with the occasional pop culture junk and whatever else seizes my attention as I scan online news sites.:: 6.30.2004 ::
:: "U.S. Forms Tribunal for 3 Terror Suspects" ::
GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba (AP) - The U.S. military has formed a five-member military tribunal to preside over the first trials of terror suspects held at its naval base in Guantanamo Bay, officials said Tuesday. An Australian and two alleged bodyguards of Osama bin laden will be the first defendants.
The Pentagon announcement came a day after the Supreme Court ruled that prisoners at Guantanamo Bay can appeal their detention to civilian courts.
That ruling was a blow to President Bush's stance that the United States can jail terror suspects without judicial review and that the Cuban base was outside the reach of U.S. courts. Relatives and advocates are now planning hundreds of lawsuits to challenge the detainees' captivity.
The trials - of an Australian, a Sudanese and a Yemeni - would be the first military tribunals convened by the United States since the end of World War II.
"This is an important first step," Air Force Maj. John Smith, a lawyer who helped draft the tribunal rules, said in a telephone interview from the Pentagon. "We'd like to have a case tried by the end of the year."
Smith said the trials would be held at the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, where detainees have been held since January 2002 and now number about 600 from 42 countries.
Read more here.
posted by me
:: 12:43:00 AM [+] ::
...
