WASHINGTON (AFP) — The trial of Osama bin Laden's former driver, Salim Hamdan, before a special US military tribunal in Guantanamo will enter its final phase next week, US officials said on Friday.
The "prosecution and defense closing arguments in US versus Hamdan are now scheduled for Monday morning," said Defense Department spokesman Jeffrey Gordon.
A jury of military officers will then begin deliberations on a verdict in the case, the first full-scale trial under the tribunals created by President George W. Bush to try suspects in the US "war on terror."
The trial of Hamdan, a Yemeni accused of conspiracy and giving material support to terrorism, opened two weeks ago before the special military tribunal amid criticism from human rights groups that the case should have been tried in a regular civilian or military court.
Captured in November 2001 in Afghanistan, Hamdan has spent more than six years behind bars at the prison at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, much of it in isolation. He faces a maximum sentence of life in prison.
US prosecutors portrayed Hamdan as a militant loyal to Al-Qaeda who transported arms for the terror network. His defense lawyers rejected the accusation, saying he was merely working for bin Laden to support his family and that he was not implicated in any Al-Qaeda operation.
Some witnesses told the tribunal that Hamdan was not aware or informed in advance of attacks instigated by his employer.
On Friday, the defense reportedly presented written testimony from Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the suspected mastermind behind the attacks of September 11, 2001 against New York and Washington.
"He was not with the ideology of Osama bin Laden and people like him, he was only searching for pleasure and money in this life," he wrote of Hamdan, according to the Miami Herald.
Hamdan's lawyers are expected to appeal any guilty verdict and have argued that he was mistreated while in US custody.
The Bush administration has faced heated criticism from human rights groups for detaining prisoners for years at Guantanamo without giving them the right to defend themselves in court.
Hamdan's case will be an important test of the military commission system. Of the 260 detainees currently in Guantanamo, only around 20 have been charged with a crime and the government plans to put only 60 to 80 of them on trial.
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