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9/11
Newly unsealed documents give one of the most detailed views yet of the evidence gathered on the accused 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, including how prosecutors allege he and others interacted with the hijackers who carried out the September 11, 2001 attacks. The summaries of evidence released Thursday include Mohammed's own statements over the years, phone records and other documents alleging coordination between Mohammed and the hijackers, videos included in al-Qaida's planning for the attacks and prosecutors' summaries of government simulations of the flights of the four airliners that day. But few other details were given. Also to be presented are the photos and death certificates of 2,976 people killed that day at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and in a Pennsylvania field, where the fourth airliner commandeered by the al-Qaida hijackers smashed into the ground after a revolt by passengers. The newly revealed framework of military prosecutors' potential case ...
The Biden administration doubled down Thursday on its unusual court battle to derail a plea deal that the government itself had reached with accused 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. It urged a federal appeals panel to block Mohammed's guilty plea from going forward as scheduled Friday at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Defence lawyers described the attempts to throw out the agreement as the latest in two decades of fitful and negligent mishandling of the case by the US military and successive administrations. The fight has put the Biden administration at odds with the US military officials it had appointed to oversee justice in al-Qaida's attacks on Sept 11, 2001, that killed nearly 3,000 people. It was the latest tumult and uncertainty in two decades of troubled prosecution tied to one of the deadliest attacks on American soil. A new filing Thursday from Justice Department lawyers argued that the gravity of the extraordinarily important case warranted Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin ..
The US is remembering the lives taken and those reshaped by 9/11, marking an anniversary laced this year with presidential campaign politics. Sept 11 the date when hijacked plane attacks killed nearly 3,000 people in 2001 falls in the thick of the presidential election season every four years, and it comes at an especially pointed moment this time. Fresh off their first-ever debate Tuesday night, Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump are both expected to attend 9/11 observances at the World Trade Center in New York and the Flight 93 National Memorial in Pennsylvania. Then-senators and presidential campaign rivals John McCain and Barack Obama made a visible effort to put politics aside on the 2008 anniversary. They visited ground zero together to pay their respects and lay flowers in a reflecting pool at what was then still a pit. It's not yet clear whether Harris and Trump even will cross paths. If they do, it would be an extraordinary encounter at a somb
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, accused as the main plotter in al-Qaeda's September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, has agreed to plead guilty, the Defense Department said, pointing to a long-delayed resolution in an attack that altered the course of the United States and much of the Middle East. He and two accomplices, Walid Bin Attash and Mustafa al-Hawsawi, are expected to enter the pleas at the military commission at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, as soon as next week. Pentagon officials declined to immediately release the terms of the plea bargain. The New York Times, citing unidentified Pentagon officials, said the terms included the men's longstanding condition that they be spared risk of the death penalty. The US agreement with the men to enter into a plea agreement comes more than 16 years after their prosecution began for al-Qaeda's attack. It comes more than 20 years after militants flew commandeered commercial airliners into buildings. The attack killed nearly 3,000 people and ..
The suspected architect of the September 11, 2001, attacks and his fellow defendants may never face the death penalty under plea agreements now under consideration to bring an end to their more than decadelong prosecution, the Pentagon and FBI have advised families of some of the thousands killed. The notice, made in a letter that was sent to several of the families and obtained by The Associated Press, comes 1 1/2 years after military prosecutors and defence lawyers began exploring a negotiated resolution to the case. The prosecution of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four others held at the US detention centre in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, has been troubled by repeated delays and legal disputes, especially over the legal ramifications of the interrogation under torture that the men initially underwent while in CIA custody. No trial date has been set. The Office of the Chief Prosecutor has been negotiating and is considering entering into pre-trial agreements, or PTAs, the letter said. It to