An accused September 11th conspirator told the US military war court at Guantanamo today that he should have access to classified evidence against him.
Walid bin Attash, a Yemeni accused of running an al-Qaeda camp where two of the September 11th hijackers trained in Afghanistan, made his second appearance before the war court at the remote US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
He described himself as proud of any role he played in attacks on the United States.
A hearing for another of the suspects, Yemeni Ramzi Binalshibh, was postponed until after an assessment of his mental competency.
Bin Attash told the judge, Col Ralph Kohlmann, that he had made his own decision and objected to being denied pretrial access to classified evidence that could be used against him.
"As a judge appointed by the American government . . . do you think this is a just and fair trial?" said bin Attash.
Col Kohlmann declined to answer. He has explained to each of the defendants that if they act as their own lawyers, they will not see classified material or any other documents he decides are sensitive before they are presented as evidence in court.
Bin Attash argued that any secrets he saw would be well protected. "If I am going to receive the death sentence this evidence will go with me," he said. "It will be better protected than in the hands of the FBI or the CIA."
Bin Attash and Binalshibh are accused along with alleged September 11th mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Ali Abdul Aziz Ali and Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi of conspiring to kill civilians in the 2001 hijacked airliner attacks on the United States, which triggered the Bush administration's global "war on terrorism".
The men face 2,973 counts of murder, one for each person killed when the planes crashed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania.