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Ellison presses for answers on cameraman held at Guantanamo
A campaign to free a journalist imprisoned at Guantanamo gained support Thursday from the first Muslim member of Congress, who urged authorities to prosecute or release him after more than five years without charges.
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A campaign to free a journalist imprisoned at Guantanamo gained support Thursday from the first Muslim member of Congress, who urged authorities to prosecute or release him after more than five years without charges.
Sami al-Haj, a Sudanese cameraman for Al Jazeera, was captured in 2002 as he tried to enter Afghanistan to cover the war. His lawyer says he denies any connection to terrorism and has been on a hunger strike since January to protest his confinement.
In a rare show of public support from a U.S. official, Minnesota Rep. Keith Ellison, a Democrat, called for a hearing to determine whether the military has legitimate reason to hold Al-Haj with about 330 other men at the prison on a Navy base in Cuba. "If he's a bad actor, prove it. If not, let him out," the congressman told the Associated Press.
He said he believes all Guantanamo detainees should be allowed to challenge their confinement in the courts. But he said he is particularly concerned about the detention of a journalist who, as far as he can tell, was "detained for taking pictures."
He made the statement at the request of Al Jazeera. Ellison said he might seek a meeting with military officials or use his seat on the Judiciary Committee to press for more information about Al-Haj's case.
JAPAN ENDS NAVY REFUELING MISSION
Japan's Defense Ministry ordered home its naval ships from the Indian Ocean on Thursday, ending for now a six-year mission in support of the war in Afghanistan that raised the nation's military presence overseas but has recently drawn increasing criticism domestically.
A destroyer and supply ship that had been refueling warships for the United States and other nations were recalled at 3 p.m. as a special law authorizing the mission was set to expire at midnight. The government of Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda was unable to renew the law immediately because of opposition from the Democratic Party. The United States had urged Japan to extend the refueling mission which, while largely symbolic, provided important diplomatic support for Washington.
LONDON POLICE GUILTY IN ANTI-TERROR CASE
In a surprise verdict, London's police force was found guilty of putting the public at risk during a flawed anti-terrorism operation that ended in the killing of a Brazilian electrician in 2005.
The Metropolitan Police force was fined $364,000 and will have to pay $800,000 in legal costs.
On July 22, 2005, in an operation prosecutors described as chaotic, police officers wrongly identified the Brazilian as one of the four men who had tried to detonate bombs on London's transport system the day before, an attempt that came just two weeks after four bombers killed themselves and 52 others on the transit system. The officers followed the man, Jean Charles de Menezes, 27, into a subway train at Stockwell, in South London, and shot him seven times in the head in front of horrified passengers.
De Menezes' family pressed for the resignations of officers in charge of the operation, but the London jury cleared individual officers and instead ruled Thursday that the organization as a whole was to take some responsibility.
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