The United States has announced plea agreements with three men detained at Guantanamo Bay and charged with planning the September 11, 2001 attacks, including the alleged mastermind, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. The Pentagon has not disclosed the full details of these agreements, which also involve Walid bin Attash and Mustafa al-Hawsawi, but American media report that the three men will plead guilty in exchange for a life sentence instead of the death penalty.
The three men were initially scheduled to face trial in a military court at the high-security facility, but their cases have been hindered by legal maneuvers for years. Karen Greenberg, director of the Center on National Security at Fordham University School of Law, describes these agreements as a significant development. “This means a lot,” she told Al Jazeera. “It means that this trial, which has been delayed for 12 years, will not take place. The issue has been resolved with this plea deal. It means that the idea of bringing an end to Guantanamo is one step closer.”
In the September 11 attacks, nearly 3,000 people were killed when members of the terrorist group al-Qaeda hijacked four domestic flights and crashed them into the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon building outside Washington, D.C. The fourth plane crashed into a field in Pennsylvania after passengers struggled against the hijackers. The attacks led to what then-President George W. Bush termed the “War on Terror,” resulting in U.S. military invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as years of operations against militant groups in the Middle East.
The three men are expected to appear in court as early as next week to formally enter their pleas. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, regarded as one of Osama bin Laden’s most trusted and intelligent aides, was captured in a covert operation in Pakistan in March 2003. He spent three years in secret CIA prisons before arriving at Guantanamo in 2006. Mohammed, who holds an engineering degree from an American university, was subjected to waterboarding 183 times during his CIA detention and also endured other forms of torture and coercive interrogation.
Bin Attash, a Saudi citizen of Yemeni origin, reportedly trained two of the hijackers involved in the September 11 attacks. His American interrogators have claimed that he admitted to purchasing explosives and recruiting members of the team that killed 17 sailors in an attack on the USS Cole. He was captured alongside Mohammed in 2003 and was also detained in secret CIA prisons.
Hawsawi is suspected of managing the financing for the 9/11 attacks. He was arrested in Pakistan on March 1, 2003, and was also held in secret prisons before being transferred to Guantanamo in 2006.
The use of torture has proven to be one of the most formidable obstacles to the United States’ efforts to prosecute the men at Guantanamo, as evidence related to mistreatment cannot be used in court. Torture has been a major factor in the delays to the trial proceedings, alongside the location of the court in Cuba. The military commissions at Guantanamo were established by former President Bush in 2001 to prosecute individuals charged with organizing the September 11 attacks and other attacks outside the framework of U.S. criminal law.