US President Barack Obama has restarted a Bush-era military trial system for a small number of Guantanamo detainees, but with new legal protections for suspects.

US president Barack Obama’s Justice Department shocked human rights activists today as it backed the former Bush administration, saying detainees in Afghanistan had no constitutional rights.

The US government wants an Iraqi court to handle criminal charges against a naturalised American citizen who is being held in Iraq on suspicion that he is linked to insurgent leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.