[JURIST] US Department of Defense [official website] prosecutors announced Monday they had filed charges [press release] related to the 2000 al Qaeda attack [US DOD inquiry report; JURIST news archive] on the USS Cole [official website] against Guantanamo Bay detainee Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri [Globalsecurity backgrounder]. Al-Nashiri, a Saudi national, is charged with terrorism, attempted murder, and providing material support to terrorism, among other offenses. The charges fall under the Military Commissions Act of 2006 [PDF text; JURIST news archive] and must now be approved by Convening Authority Susan J. Crawford, who will decide whether to refer the charges to military commission. AP has more.

Last year, al-Nashiri said that his confession to planning the USS Cole attack was coerced through torture [JURIST report] at Guantanamo. In 2004, a Yemeni security court charged [JURIST report] al-Nashiri in absentia in connection with the attack, saying he belonged to the al Qaeda terrorist network. In 2005, a Yemeni appeals court upheld a death sentence [JURIST reports] against al-Nashiri.