Pentagon Charges Inmate in Terror Strike

The Pentagon charged a Guantanamo inmate today in the 1998 US embassy bombing in Tanzania that killed 11 people, the New York Times reports. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani, saying he remained an al-Qaeda agent after the attack and worked as a bodyguard to Osama bin Laden. But the charges quickly drew fire from critics of Guantanamo Bay tribunals.

“This seems like an attempt to subvert and do an end run around the existing criminal justice system,” a human rights advocate said. Critics add that Ghailani was already indicted in the bombing by a New York court that has convicted four other plotters. Ghailani, believed to be 34, was one of the world's most infamous terrorists when he was caught in Pakistan in 2004. (More Guantanamo Bay stories.)