The US is tearing up the 9/11 settlement

Published 3 August 2024 at 13.01

Foreign. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin has revoked a non-prosecution decision reached after a settlement with some of those accused of planning the attacks on September 11, 2001, reports Fox News.

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In a memo Friday, Austin also said he revoked the authority of the official in charge of the military court that signed the agreement Wednesday.

The original agreement, which reportedly would have shielded the alleged terrorists from the death penalty, was criticized by some of the victims' relatives.

The 9/11 attacks in New York, Virginia and Pennsylvania were the deadliest attacks on American soil since the 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, where 2,400 people died.

The attacks triggered the “war on terror” and the subsequent US invasion of Afghanistan. The attacks were also used as an argument when the US Israel lobby finally persuaded the then-Bush administration to invade Iraq, despite the country's lack of links to the 9/11 attacks,

In his memo yesterday, Austin named five defendants, including the alleged ringleader Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, all of whom are being held at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba.

The original settlement named three men.

“My assessment is that a decision not to prosecute – given how important it is in this case – should rest on me as superior authority,” writes Austin in his memo to Brigadier General Susan Escallier.

“I hereby revoke your authority effective immediately. By exercising my authority, I am also rescinding the three non-prosecution orders,” Austin wrote.

The White House said on Wednesday that it had played no role in the agreement .

The five men named in the memorandum were: Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, often referred to as KSM, Walid Muhammad Salih Mubarak bin Attash, Mustafa Ahmed Adam al-Hawsawi; and two others not mentioned in the original version: Ramzi bin al-Shibh and Ali Abdul Aziz Ali.

The men have been detained for decades without trial. All have stated that they were tortured. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, for example, was subjected to mock immersion, so-called “waterboarding”, 183 times before it was banned by the US government.

A Guantanamo lawyer representing Mohammed told The New York Times that he was shocked by the sudden U-turn.

“If the Defense Secretary issued such an order, I am, with all due respect, deeply disappointed that after all these years the government still hasn't learned how to handle this case,” the lawyer said Gary Sowards.

The men will now be charged with a range of crimes, including attack on civilians, murder in violation of the laws of war, hijacking and terrorism.

South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham said in his side that the decision indicated “exercising good judgment”.

– The previous agreement would have sent completely the wrong signal to terrorists around the world, he added.