Bin Laden's driver charged

WASHINGTON - The United States has charged a Yemeni described as a bodyguard and driver for Osama bin Laden with conspiracy, making him the fourth Guantanamo prisoner to face trial before a military tribunal.

Salim Ahmed Hamdan, one of 594 prisoners held at the US naval base at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, was charged with a single count of conspiracy to commit murder, attacks on civilians and terrorism.

The charge sheet does not refer to any killing or other specific act of violence committed by Hamdan.

Pentagon spokesman Major Michael Shavers said the Government would not seek the death penalty.

Hamdan will face a tribunal of five officers - formally called a military commission - but the Pentagon said no trial date had been set.

The US military commissions, the first of their kind since World War II, have faced criticism from human rights groups who argue that the rules are rigged to hamstring defence lawyers and produce convictions.

Lieutenant Commander Charles Swift, the military lawyer assigned by the Pentagon to defend Hamdan, filed a lawsuit in April in federal court in Seattle arguing that the tribunals represent an unconstitutional expansion of executive branch powers.

The Pentagon described Hamdan, held for more than two years at Guantanamo, as a member of al Qaeda and said he first met bin Laden at Kandahar, Afghanistan, in 1996.

The charge sheet said Hamdan became a bodyguard and personal driver for the Saudi-born al Qaeda chief, serving in those roles until his capture in Afghanistan in November 2001 in military operations launched after the September 11 terror attacks on the US.

Hamdan allegedly gained weapons training at an al Qaeda camp and drove or accompanied bin Laden to camps, news conferences and lectures.

The charge sheet also accuses Hamdan of delivering weapons, ammunition and other supplies to al Qaeda members, and picking up weapons from Taleban warehouses for use by the head of al Qaeda's security committee.

The Government says Hamdan is an "unprivileged belligerent" who, unlike a uniformed soldier in a nation's army, does not have the right to kill another person in battle.

President George W. Bush has designated 15 prisoners as eligible for trials before military tribunals. The charge against Hamdan was brought 12 months after Bush first designated him as eligible for trial.

Now there are four

* The same tribunal that will hear Salim Ahmed Hamdan's case will handle the trials of the other three charged Guantanamo prisoners.

* Australian David Hicks was charged last month with three counts: conspiracy to commit war crimes, attempted murder and aiding the enemy.

* Ali Hamza Ahmed Sulayman al Bahlul, of Yemen, and Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud al Qosi, of Sudan, were charged in February with a single count each of conspiracy to commit war crimes.

* No trial dates have been set in those cases.

- REUTERS