BAGHDAD - An Iraqi-Canadian translator goes on trial before a U.S. military court Sunday for allegedly stabbing a fellow contractor in the first such military prosecution since the Vietnam War.
Alaa Mohammad Ali has been charged with aggravated assault for allegedly stabbing another contractor four times during a fight Feb. 23 on a base near Hit, 140 kilometres west of Baghdad.
The court martial is to convene Sunday afternoon at Camp Victory, headquarters of U.S. forces in Iraq.
It will be the first trial under a 2006 amendment to the Uniformed Code of Military Justice which enables civilian employees in a combat zone to be tried for offences before a military court.
In 2006, Senator Lindsey Graham added a measure to a defence spending bill that made civilians working for the U.S. military in a `contingency operation' subject to courts martial.
The provision was intended to close the legal loophole that made it difficult to successfully prosecute such individuals in conflicts were Congress had not formally declared a state of war.
