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June 22nd, 2012 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda
No one above the rank of sergeant was among the 11 soldiers punished for the
Abu Ghraib scandal where Iraqi prisoners were stripped naked, photographed,
beaten, humiliated and even sodomised with a broom.
At the time, there was outrage that senior officers and officials – who
lawyers argued had created a climate where abuse was officially encouraged –
escaped scrutiny thanks to rulings handed down by Judge Pohl, lawyers will
argue.
The motion to dismiss Judge Pohl is the latest in a series of attempts by
defence lawyers for the USS Cole bomber and the 9/11 conspirators, lead by
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, to call into question the validity of the Guantánamo
Bay military tribunals.
Military Commission officials insist the tribunals, which were revamped in
2009 to include new legal safeguards, do live up their motto of “fairness,
transparency, justice”.
However in other sections of the motion, which is due to be heard on July 17,
defence lawyers will also argue it is wrong that Judge Pohl has appointed
himself to try all three of the major ongoing al-Qaeda cases at Guantánamo
Bay.
“The same judge shouldn’t be hearing all these three cases. If the system
is so ‘legitimate’, the judge should be randomly assigned, as he would be in
any other US court,” said Mr Kammen who is also petitioning for the
Guantánamo hearings to be televised nationally.
Concerns are also being raised over the Judge’s contractual situation, which
lawyers say leaves him vulnerable to government pressure to secure
convictions.
Judge Pohl officially took mandatory retirement from the US Army in 2010, but
was rehired on a rolling one-year contract at the rate of $10,557 (£6,757) a
month.
“This contract is worth over $120,000 (£76,800) a year to Judge Pohl, so
our position given that he’s dependent on this contract for what is almost
certainly half of his income, if not more, under US law he is too close to
one side,” said Mr Kammen.
“At the very least there’s a reasonable perception that he would rule
favourably to the government to protect his contract.”
As an example, they cite the case of a former Military Commissions chief
presiding officer, Col Peter Brownback, who had a similar rolling one-year
contract terminated in 2007 after he dismissed charges against the Canadian
youth Omar Khadr, to the fury of the US government.
“Brownback made a ruling which really caused some problems for the
government and ‘lo and behold’, a few months later when his contract came up
for renewal, it wasn’t renewed,” concluded Mr Kammen, “Judge
Pohl’s contractual situation sets up a clear conflict of interest.”
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