WASHINGTON, Nov. 8 (UPI) -- A federal judge in Washington Monday ruled that an al-Qaida suspect at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, cannot be tried for war crimes in secrecy.
The Justice Department said immediately it would ask for a stay of the ruling and appeal.
Lawyers for Salim Ahmed Hamdan had filed suit challenging the Defense Department's plan to try him "for alleged war crimes before a military commission convened under special orders issued by the president of the United States, rather than before a court-martial convened under the Uniform Code of Military Justice."
The judge ruled that unless a "competent tribunal" determines that Hamdan is not entitled to prisoner-of-war status, he may only be tried by a court-martial under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, which provides him some rights. A trial in which evidence is withheld from Hamdan now would be "unlawful," the judge ruled, and he must be returned to the general population at Camp Delta.
Hamdan was captured in Afghanistan in late 2001 and transferred to Guantanamo sometime in 2002.
