Gitmo: U.S. resident faces terror charges

WASHINGTON, Feb. 15 (UPI) -- A former Baltimore-area man detained at the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, military facility was charged with terrorism-related crimes, military officials said.

The military accused Majid Khan, a Pakistani citizen and a former legal U.S. resident, of conspiring with Khalid Sheik Mohammed -- who claims he orchestrated the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center towers and the Pentagon -- to conduct follow-up operations in the United States, such as targeting underground gasoline storage tanks, The Washington Post reported Wednesday.

Khan was charged Tuesday with murder, attempted murder, spying and providing material support for terrorism, officials said. He also is accused of planning to assassinate former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf.

Military officials said Khan traveled at least twice to Pakistan in 2002 and worked directly for Mohammed. The military said his tasks included taking $50,000 to an al-Qaida affiliate in Bangkok that used the money to underwrite the August 2003 bombing of the JW Marriott Hotel in Jakarta, Indonesia, in which 11 people were killed and more than 80 others were wounded.

Khan was captured at a relative's house in Pakistan in March 2003 and turned over to the United States. The Post said Khan was in the CIA's system of overseas prisons until President George W. Bush announced he was a "high-value" detainee who had been transferred to Guantanamo Bay in September 2006.

Khan's attorneys at the Center for Constitutional Rights claim he was tortured and coerced into making self-incriminating statements. If convicted, Khan faces up to life in prison.