A former Qaeda battlefield commander who admitted that his insurgents killed 17 U.S. and allied forces in wartime Afghanistan within the early 2000s will spend eight extra years in jail underneath a plea settlement disclosed on Thursday.
The prisoner, Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi, 63, has been in U.S. custody since 2006 and struck the deal two years in the past. The navy choose, Col. Charles L. Pritchard Jr., formally disclosed the phrases at Guantánamo Bay moments after a navy jury ordered Mr. Hadi to serve 30 years in jail, the utmost sentence in his warfare crime case.
The result was a part of the arcane system referred to as navy commissions, which permits prisoners to succeed in plea offers with a senior official on the Pentagon who oversees the warfare court docket however requires the formality of a jury sentencing listening to anyway.
The jury of 11 officers rejected arguments by Mr. Hadi’s protection lawyer that the prisoner deserved leniency, if not clemency, for his early humiliations in C.I.A. custody, subsequent cooperation with U.S. investigators and failing well being.
“Justice was served at the moment,” mentioned Invoice Eggers, whose son Capt. Daniel Eggers, 28, was killed in a roadside bombing carried out by Mr. Hadi’s fighters. Mr. Eggers, who has been attending proceedings within the case since 2017, mentioned he considered the jury resolution to present Mr. Hadi the harshest of potential sentences a simply conclusion, the plea deal discount however.
Mr. Eggers and his daughter had been amongst six folks who testified final week about their loss within the two-week sentencing trial.
Mr. Hadi seemed stoic because the sentence was introduced. Not like the jury, he was conscious of the deal that decreased his sentence to 10 years, beginning along with his responsible plea in June 2022. He’s disabled by a paralyzing backbone illness and a sequence of surgical procedures at Guantánamo and sat in court docket in a padded therapeutic chair, listening by way of a headset offering Arabic translation.
The case was an uncommon one on the court docket, which was created to prosecute terrorism circumstances as warfare crimes after the assaults of Sept. 11, 2001. Whereas prosecutors forged Mr. Hadi as a member of the Qaeda interior circle earlier than these assaults, there was no suggestion in his plea settlement that he knew in regards to the plot beforehand.
As a substitute, he admitted to being the commander of rebel forces who unlawfully used the duvet of civilians in assaults that killed 17 U.S. and coalition forces in Afghanistan in 2003 and 2004, for instance having a fighter pose as an extraordinary driver in a taxi cab laden with explosives.
He additionally admitted to being a Qaeda liaison to the Taliban earlier than the Sept. 11 assaults, and to offering a few of his forces to assist blow up monumental Buddha statues in Afghanistan’s Bamiyan Valley, a UNESCO World Heritage website, in March 2001.
The prisoner, who says his true identify is Nashwan al-Tamir, was captured in Turkey in 2006 and was held incommunicado for about six months by the C.I.A. By regulation, he was not entitled to credit score for that interval, or the 15 years and eight months he had spent in U.S. detention earlier than his 2022 responsible plea. If he had been to be launched, in June 2032, underneath the deal, he would have been held for greater than 25 years as a prisoner of the USA.
However Mr. Hadi’s future is unsure. Warfare court docket prosecutors have argued {that a} prisoner could also be held at Guantánamo even after his sentence ends so long as the warfare towards terrorism continues. Alternatively, underneath the deal, the USA may switch him to the custody of a companion nation, if one could be discovered that’s able to offering specialised well being care and agrees to observe his actions.
Members of his protection group, which included Military, Air Drive and Marine attorneys, seemed downcast because the sentence was introduced.
“He expressed regret,” mentioned Susan Hensler, a civilian lawyer who led the group. “He understands the seriousness of what he pleaded responsible to, however he’s relying on the USA to meet its promise of transferring him to a companion nation with a well being care infrastructure to look after him.”
