[JURIST] The US House of Representatives Intelligence Committee [official website] on Friday released a report [documents, PDF] stating that the Obama administration properly responded to the 2012 attack [BBC backgrounder] on the US consulate in Benghazi, Libya. The committee, which is led by Republicans, concluded that there was no failure of intelligence and no delay in sending a rescue team. In a statement [press release] by committee chairman Mike Rogers [official profile], he announced:

“…the House Intelligence Committee’s investigation into the Benghazi attacks focused on the Intelligence Community’s activities before, during, and after the attacks in Benghazi, Libya, on September 11-12, 2012. The bipartisan panel concluded that there was no stand down order issued by or to intelligence community personnel, and there was no denial of air support to intelligence community officers on the ground. The officers present testified to that effect.”

The committee spent [BBC report] “thousands of hours of detailed investigation” to reach its conclusion, including interviews with high ranking American officials and agents. The Obama administration had been persistently accused of mishandling the situation by responding too slowly and allegedly nixing a military rescue.

The 2012 attack in Benghazi was one of the more significant attacks involving the US in recent years. In October Libyan militant Ahmed Abu Khatallah pleaded not guilty [JURIST report] to 17 charges related to the attack, including some charges that warrant the death penalty. In June Khatallah made his first appearance [JURIST report] in the US District Court for the District of Columbia where he pleaded not guilty to a federal terrorism offense. Khatallah was indicted by a federal grand jury on the charge of “conspiracy to provide material support and resources to terrorists, knowing and intending that these would be used in preparation for and in carrying out a killing in the course of an attack on a federal facility, and the offense resulted in death.” Khatallah was also captured [JURIST report] in June by US military forces who conducted a secret operation in Libya to do so. In August 2013 the US Department of Justice filed the first criminal charges [JURIST report] against an unspecified number of individuals involved in the attack.