Bin Laden's 'accountant' boycotts Guantanamo review

Osama bin Laden’s alleged accountant boycotted a review hearing to evaluate his legal status, the second Guantanamo Bay prisoner in less than a week whose lawyer was prohibited from attending the proceedings.

Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud al Qosi, 44, is one of four prisoners charged with war crimes at the US naval base detention centre on Cuba. The US says al Qosi, from Sudan, worked as al Qaida’s chief accountant, paymaster and supply chief.

It was unclear why al Qosi did not attend yesterday’s hearing.

Defence lawyers have criticised the review hearings as shams, warning their clients not to speak in any proceedings unless they have a lawyer present. A decision on their status can still be rendered without the participation of the prisoners.

Although the government views the hearings as purely administrative, there is nothing that prohibits prosecutors from using testimony given at the review hearings during the military commissions, or trials. Al Qosi’s trial is scheduled for December.

Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Sharon Shaffer, al Qosi’s defence lawyer for the commissions, said she was not told when her client’s review hearing was but was told she could not attend.

During the time that she has spent with al Qosi at the US outpost, she and her Arabic translator have taught him how to ask – in English – for his lawyer.

The review hearings are separate from the military commissions and are intended to determine whether each of the 549 prisoners at Guantanamo should be freed or were properly classified as enemy combatants, a classification that has fewer legal protections than a prisoner of war.

Al Qosi became the 30th detainee to boycott the so-called Combatant Status Review Tribunals, said a government official.

Defence lawyers and human rights groups say the tribunals do not satisfy a US Supreme Court ruling allowing prisoners to challenge their detentions in civilian courts, where they would be allowed legal representation.