GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba - A Guantanamo detainee admitted helping Osama bin Laden evade capture after the Sept. 11 attacks, U.S. federal agents have testified, countering defense assertions that the man had no role in terrorism.
Salim Ahmed Hamdan told interrogators he chauffeured bin Laden between locations in Afghanistan to avoid U.S. retaliation after the al Qaeda attacks on New York and Washington, agents from the FBI and Department of Defense told a court Thursday at this isolated military outpost.
At one point, Hamdan recalled overhearing bin Laden say he expected no more than 1,500 people would killed in the 2001 attacks, Special Agent George Crouch said. Nearly 3,000 people died.
"When Osama bin Laden learned it was much larger than that he was very pleased," Crouch recalled Hamdan telling him and two other FBI agents during interrogation sessions at Guantanamo.
The testimony came in a pretrial hearing to determine whether Hamdan can be prosecuted. The detainee, who has been held at Guantanamo Bay for nearly six years, is charged with conspiracy and supporting terrorism, and prosecutors called witnesses to bolster their case that he is an unlawful enemy combatant eligible to face the special court. The two-day hearing ended late Thursday with the judge saying he would issue a written ruling later.
The defense maintains Hamdan was one of several drivers for bin Laden and had no advance knowledge of or role in terrorist attacks.
Hamdan's lawyers want him declared a prisoner of war, which would entitle him to greater legal protections than those now afforded to prisoners at Guantanamo designated as "unlawful enemy combatants."
Crouch said Hamdan left his native Yemen in 1996 and ended up in Afghanistan, where he was hired as a driver by bin Laden and later became a member of the al Qaeda leader's security detachment.
Robert McFadden, a Department of Defense agent who interrogated Hamdan in 2003, said the detainee drove bin Laden's son, Uthman, at least once with the al-Qaida leader. Hamdan, who is now about 37, was paid US$200 to $300 a month plus $100 for housing, McFadden said.
Just before the deadly 1998 al Qaeda bombings of two U.S. embassies in East Africa, Hamdan helped evacuate bin Laden's compound in Afghanistan, Crouch testified.
"This was going to be the first time Osama bin Laden was going to go toe-to-toe or face-to-face with the United States and he was unsure what the reaction would be," the agent said.
Hamden also knew of bin Laden's involvement in the attack on the USS Cole in 2000, Crouch said.
Also Thursday, a U.S. Army officer said Hamdan was not wearing a uniform when he was captured in November 2001 in Afghanistan while driving a car with two surface-to-air missiles inside. The testimony was intended to underscore the U.S. contention that Hamden was not a traditional soldier deserving POW status.
Defense lawyers pointed out that many Afghan fighters under U.S. command did not wear what might be considered typical military garb and that no other weapons were found in Hamden's car -- even though he had a permit from the Taliban to carry a sidearm.
The defense called another detainee, Said Boujaadia, a 39-year-old Moroccan who the military says was captured just before Hamdan at a military checkpoint in Afghanistan. But Boujaadia, who has been cleared for release from Guantanamo, testified that Hamdan was already in Afghan custody. Civilian defense attorney Harry Schneider noted there were discrepancies in military documents about the capture of the two men.
Crouch said the FBI believed Hamdan could not have been ignorant of al Qaeda's workings.
"It didn't make sense to us as investigators that an individual assigned to drive Osama bin Laden, and be so close, would not be part of al Qaeda or have understanding of inner workings of al Qaeda," Crouch said.
The witnesses were the first to testify at a Guantanamo hearing since Congress and the Bush administration last year came up with new rules for military trials, known as commissions, after the U.S. Supreme Court tossed out the old version.
On Wednesday, the military judge presiding at the hearing rejected a defense request to talk to the alleged mastermind of the Sept. 11 attack and two other "high value" detainees.
Hamdan faces up to life in prison if tried and convicted. He followed the proceedings closely through a translator, smiling when his fellow detainee showed up in court and laughing when Boujaadia had problems with the translation headphones.
Hamdan's case has been delayed by legal challenges, including one he filed that went to the Supreme Court and resulted in the striking down of the original rules for military tribunals.
The U.S. now holds about 305 prisoners at Guantanamo on suspicion of terrorism or links to al Qaeda and the Taliban and plans to prosecute about 80. Only three detainees have been formally charged and one, Australian David Hicks, was convicted in a plea bargain and sent home.
