JURIST - Paper Chase: US Supreme Court asked to rule on Gitmo military commissions

[JURIST] Lawyers for Salim Ahmed Hamdan, Osama bin Laden's former driver and alleged al Qaeda member, have asked the US Supreme Court to hear their challenge to the government's strategy in holding military commissions for detainees at Guantanamo Bay. In a ruling handed down earlier this month, US District Judge James Robertson blocked Hamdan's trial, saying that the government must first determine that the detainees are not prisoners of war before putting them on trial. Judge Robertson also ruled that the detainees are entitled to more legal rights and that the guidelines for the trials must be changed. The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia agreed to hear the Justice Department's appeal of the ruling on a fast-track schedule, but the Supreme Court has now been asked to hear the case first. Lawyers for Hamdan say that courts, alleged enemy combatants "and the world community stand to benefit from clear guidance as to how the United States may wage the legal war on terror in the future. Our country has a pressing need to know that those implicated in that war are being treated in the way the Constitution, our statutes, and the laws of war demand." AP has more.

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