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International

Transferred Guantanamo inmate fit to stand trial: judge

International Desk |
Update: 2010-07-01 14:57:22

WASHINGTON: Tanzanian Ahmed Khalfan Ghailiani, the first Guantanamo prisoner transferred to the US mainland, is not suffering from mental stress and is fit to stand trial in New York in September, a judge said Thursday.

Charged in the 1998 bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, Ghailiani was arrested in 2004 and held in secret prisons by the Central Intelligence Agency before being transferred to the US naval facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Defense lawyers argue Ghailiani suffers from post traumatic stress disorder after five years of detention at Guantanamo.

But federal court judge Lewis Kaplan ruled Ghailiani was not suffering "any mental disease or defect" and was fit to stand trial.

The judge`s conclusion "was strongly opposed by the defense and the defense psychologist," Ghailiani`s lawyer Michael Bachrach told AFP.

BDST: 09:46 HRS, July 2, 2010

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