Former bin Laden aide to avoid solitary confinement as part of Guantanamo plea deal

Gitmo detainee to avoid solitary in plea deal

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba — A former cook and driver for Osama bin Laden will serve out his sentence in a section of Guantanamo reserved for the best-behaved detainees under a plea agreement that also keeps the length of his confinement secret for now, military attorneys said Monday.

Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud al-Qosi, one of Guantanamo’s longest-held prisoners, avoided a possible life sentence by striking a plea deal last month that also secured the first war-crimes conviction under President Barack Obama.

The military judge presiding over the case initially said Monday that al-Qosi’s sentence would not be revealed until after his release. But a spokesman for the prosecutors, Navy Capt. David Iglesias, said later that the official overseeing the offshore system will announce the sentence once it is formally approved.

The case against al-Qosi is one of two approaching resolution in the Pentagon’s system for prosecuting terrorism suspects at this U.S. Navy base in Cuba, which has yielded only four convictions since it was established by the Bush administration.

Canadian detainee Omar Khadr faces trial beginning Tuesday on charges including murder for the slaying of an American soldier in Afghanistan. The judge in his case refused Monday to exclude confessions that Khadr’s team claimed were tainted by abuse including threats of rape.

Al-Qosi, who was taken to Guantanamo in January 2002, pleaded guilty July 7 to one count each of providing material support for terrorism and conspiracy.

A jury of American military officers is expected to begin deliberating a sentence Tuesday, but officials overseeing the tribunals will reject their decision if it exceeds the terms of the plea bargain, Iglesias said. A longer sentence could be applied, however, if al-Qosi did something to break the terms of the plea deal, he added.

At the hearing inside a high-security courthouse, the 50-year-old detainee sat beside his lawyers wearing a white prison uniform, a long gray beard and translation headphones.

Without revealing details in court, prosecutors and defense attorneys said al-Qosi has fulfilled commitments that were required of him as part of the plea agreement.

But defense lawyers had complained the government has not yet delivered on its pledge to ensure that al-Qosi serves any additional prison time at Guantanamo’s Camp 4, a communal-style section reserved for the best-behaved detainees where al-Qosi is currently held. Typically, convicted detainees are held alone in solid-wall cells.

“This is the linchpin upon which this agreement is based,” said defense attorney Paul Reichler, who won a ruling from the judge ordering that al-Qosi not be put into solitary confinement.

The on-again, off-again tribunal system has faced repeated legal setbacks since it was established by then-President George W. Bush to prosecute terror suspects after the 9/11 terror attack on the U.S.

The U.S. Supreme Court in 2006 struck down one version of the military trials, known as commissions, before Congress and the Bush administration came up with new trial rules later that year.

Obama revised the system further to extend more legal protections to detainees, but human rights groups say the system is still unfair and prosecutions should be held in U.S. civilian courts instead.

Al-Qosi is the fourth Guantanamo detainee to be convicted and the first since Obama took office. Two of the others — Australian David Hicks and bin Laden driver Salim Hamdan — have already served their sentences and been returned home, while al-Qaida media chief Ali Hamza al-Bahlul is serving a life sentence at Guantanamo.

Al-Qosi followed bin Laden to Afghanistan in 1996 after the al-Qaida chief was expelled from Sudan. The trained accountant was in charge of the al-Qaida compound’s kitchen in Jalalabad and acknowledged in a signed statement that he provided other logistical support to the terrorist group. He fled the al-Qaida hideout at Tora Bora during the U.S.-led invasion, crossed the border into Pakistan and was arrested by local officials who turned him over to U.S. forces.

Khadr, who was captured when he was 15, will be the first detainee to face a contested military trial under Obama. At 23, he is the youngest inmate at Guantanamo Bay and the only remaining Westerner. He pleaded not guilty to charges including murder, conspiracy and spying.

Obama had pledged shortly after his inauguration in January 2009 to close the prison within a year. But the effort has stalled because Congress will not agree to moving prisoners to the United States.