Salim Hamdan

In a decision that will shock those watching the conclusion of the first full US war crimes trial since the Nuremberg Trials, the military jury that yesterday convicted Salim Hamdan of providing “material support for terrorism” has sentenced him to serve five and a half years in prison. Given that the judge in his case, [...]

At Guantánamo, a military jury’s verdict in the first US war crimes trial since the Nuremberg Trials of Nazi leaders after the Second World War — that Yemeni prisoner Salim Hamdan is guilty of providing material support for terrorism, but not guilty of the more serious charge of conspiracy — followed two eventful weeks of [...]

On June 12, when the Supreme Court ruled, in Boumediene v. Bush, that the prisoners at Guantánamo had constitutional habeas corpus rights, it was not immediately clear if the decision would have an impact on the Military Commissions at Guantánamo, the alternative legal system for trying “War on Terror” prisoners that was stealthily established in [...]

As a 16th prisoner at Guantánamo, Noor Uthman Muhammed, is put forward for trial by Military Commission (the much-criticized system of trials for “terror suspects” invented in the wake of the 9/11 attacks), Andy Worthington, author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison, provides a guide to the [...]

As a recent decision by a military judge makes clear, the wheels of justice revolve in slow motion at Guantánamo, as those responsible for the exercise of political and judicial processes — the executive, Congress and the Supreme Court — engage in prolonged tussles that last for years. Andy Worthington, author of The Guantánamo Files: [...]

Anyone who has kept half an eye on the proceedings at the Military Commissions in Guantánamo — the unique system of trials for “terror suspects” that was conceived in the wake of the 9/11 attacks by Vice President Dick Cheney and his close advisers — will be aware that their progress has been faltering at [...]

From the moment that the Toronto Star unleashed a gruesome, and previously unpublished photo of the chest wounds sustained by 15-year old Omar Khadr, after a firefight in Afghanistan in July 2002, it was clear that the resumption of Khadr’s pre-trial hearing at Guantánamo last week would once more raise murky issues of torture and [...]

This has been another terrible week for Guantánamo’s Military Commissions, established by Dick Cheney and his close advisors in November 2001 to try, convict and execute those responsible for 9/11 through a novel process so far removed from the US court system and the military’s own judicial procedures that the tainted fruit of torture would [...]

As pre-trial hearings take place in the US prison complex at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, Andy Worthington, author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison, looks at the stories of the three defendants whose cases are being heard this week and next –- two alleged “child soldiers,” and a [...]

On Monday, just three weeks away from Guantánamo’s sixth anniversary, military judge Captain Keith Allred dealt what appeared to be a severe blow to the legitimacy of the Military Commissions –- the unprecedented trial system established to try Guantánamo detainees for war crimes –- by ruling that he would undertake a review to determine whether [...]