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CANBERRA - The US military lawyer for Australian terrorism suspect David Hicks, Major Michael Mori, says he can't understand why his client would have been forcibly sedated.
Major Mori has demanded an explanation.
"I don't understand why they would do this to him when they have said David has been compliant for five years," he told ABC radio today.
"The commander down there has told the embassy, the consul, that David has been compliant all along. This is very strange."
Major Mori said this happened last month.
He said it was explained to him that the day Hicks was to be told about sworn charges -- the day after his legal team departed from their latest visit to Guantanamo Bay -- a medical corpsman came to Hicks and said he had a new medicine for his stomach problem and he should try it.
"David took it and then it started to basically sedate him. The next thing he knew he was being taken out of his cell and somebody was talking to him about charges," he said.
"He really couldn't comprehend what was going on. It lasted for almost 24 hours."
Major Mori said he didn't know what it was.
"Obviously we have raised it and asked that it not be done again. He shouldn't be sedated against his will," he said.
Hicks, a 31-year-old Muslim convert from Adelaide, was captured in Afghanistan in December 2001 serving with Taleban forces. He has been held at the US detention facility at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba since January 2002.
He faces a hearing of a charge of providing material support for terrorism in Guantanamo Bay next Monday. His father Terry departs Australia next Saturday to attend the hearing.
Major Mori said March marked a year of being held in solitary confinement and that hadn't gone well for him.
"You can see the impact on him, the total lack of interaction with the environment around him, being locked up in camp six," he said.
"It is certainly not conducive to providing him the sort of environment he needs to be preparing to go to trial."
- AAP
