The US Defense Department on Tuesday cleared the way for resuming the trial by military commissions of Australian David Hicks, charged with conspiracy to commit war crimes, attempted murder and aiding the enemy.

Hicks has been detained at the US military base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, since his capture in Afghanistan in late 2001.

John Altenburg, the authority in charge of appointing the US military commissions, lifted the stay in an order published on Tuesday that directed the presiding officer to hold the first session of a resumed trial of Hicks by Oct. 20, but not earlier than Oct. 3.

The Pentagon started military court proceedings against Hicks and three other Guantanamo Bay inmates in August 2004. The proceedings were suspended last November following a court ruling that Yemeni Salim Ahmed Hamdan could not be tried by a military commission unless he was first determined not a prisoner of war by a "competent tribunal."

The action on Tuesday followed a federal appeals court ruling in July that the military commission itself was a competent tribunal and Hamdan could assert his claim to prisoner of war status before a military commission.

Hamdan's lawyers have appealed that ruling to the Supreme Court, which has not decided whether to hear the case.

Hicks, who has been held for three and a half years and accused of fighting for Afghanistan's ousted Taliban regime against US forces, has pleaded innocent.

Altenburg lifted the stay only on Hicks trial. Besides Hicks and Hamdan, the other two Guantanamo prisoners whose military trials were started and then suspended were Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud al-Qosi, a Sudanese citizen, and Ali Hamza Ahmed Sulayman al-Bahlul, a Yemeni.

Only a dozen of the about 500 detainees at Guantanamo, all accused of having links to Taliban or the al-Qaida terror network, have been declared eligible for trial by military commissions.

Source: Xinhua