The Obama administration has shelved the planned prosecution of Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, the alleged coordinator of the Oct. 2000 suicide attack on the USS Cole in Yemen, according to a court filing.
The decision at least temporarily scuttles what was supposed to be the signature trial of a major al-Qaeda figure under a reformed system of military commissions. And it comes practically on the eve of the 10th anniversary of the attack, which killed 17 sailors and wounded dozens when a boat packed with explosives ripped a hole in the side of the warship in the port of Aden.
In a filing this week in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, the Justice Department said that “no charges are either pending or contemplated with respect to al-Nashiri in the near future.”
……Military officials said a team of prosecutors in the Nashiri case has been ready go to trial for some time. And several months ago, military officials seemed confident that Nashiri would be arraigned this summer.
“It’s politics at this point,” said one military official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss policy. He said he thinks the administration does not want to proceed against a high-value detainee without some prospect of civilian trials for other major figures at Guantanamo Bay.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/26/AR2010082606353.html
Oh yeah, this is the same Obama who trash-talked George W. Bush for not prosecuting the GITMO terrorists fast enough, (http://thepage.time.com/obama-remarks-on-detainees-and-afghanistan/) and “assured family members of Americans who were killed in the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole and in the Sept. 11 attacks that the terror suspects will be prosecuted and brought “to a swift and certain justice.”
(http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/06/obama-meets-with-family-members-of-uss-cole-911-victims/)
Obama will forgo the trial of the mastermind behind the attack on the USS Cole, just to guarantee civilian trials for enemy combatants.
Gawd, what an ass.
Hat Tip to Ace of Spades.
http://ace.mu.nu/archives/305089.php#305089