Pentagon issues rules for Guantanamo trials

The Pentagon on Thursday issued rules for conducting trials of terrorist suspects before special military commissions at the U.S. naval base of Guantanamo, Cuba.

The rules, contained in the Manual for Military Commissions released here by the Pentagon, permit the admission of hearsay evidence, as well as coerced detainee statements that were obtained before Dec. 30, 2005.

The move is in accordance with the Military Commissions Act of 2006, a law signed by U.S. President George W. Bush in October 2006, and will enable prosecution of detainees at Guantanamo to go forward.

The military commissions were set up by the Bush administration in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terror attacks to conduct war crime trials of terror suspects, the first of their kind since the World War Two.

The war crime proceedings were halted in November 2004 when a U. S. district judge ruled that they violated both domestic and international laws.

But Bush managed to revive the military commissions by signing Military Commissions Act of 2006 last year.

However, the law and the newly-released rules are likely to be challenged in federal court.

A leading Republican senator predicted last year that the military commission law will be struck down by the Supreme Court on constitutional grounds because it does not contain habeas corpus protections.

Thomas L. Hemingway, legal adviser to the Pentagon's Office of Military Commissions, said 14 trials had been "in various preparatory stages" at Guantanamo.

An estimated 60 to 80 of the detainees at Guantanamo are subject to war crimes charges, he said.

About 400 detainees are held at the U.S. naval base on the southeastern tip of Cuba.

Source: Xinhua