WASHINGTON, 21 August - The US government said on Monday it wants to appeal a federal judge's demand for more evidence about whether a US-born Taleban prisoner can be held as an enemy combatant.

US District Judge Robert Doumar ruled on Friday that the government must provide by today documents about the capture, classification and detention of Yaser Esam Hamdi, whose case has become a test of the government's power to hold enemy combatants in the war against terrorism.

The Justice Department had given the judge an explanation as to why the military determined that Hamdi - who has been held in a military jail in Virginia since April - was an enemy combatant, offering a declaration by Michael Mobbs, a Defense Department official, to support its decision.

Mobbs, special adviser to the undersecretary of defense for policy, wrote in the affidavit that Hamdi told US military interrogators that he went to Afghanistan last summer to train with and, if necessary, fight for the Taleban. Doumar ruled that was insufficient but the Justice Department asked him for permission to appeal that decision to the US Appeals Court for the Fourth Circuit.

"This court, however, should not require production of such sensitive information until the court of appeals has resolved the controlling legal question concerning the sufficiency of the Mobbs declaration," the government said in its request.

The government argued that Mobbs's declaration was more than sufficient to support its determination that Hamdi, a US-born Saudi, could be detained as an enemy combatant and held without access to legal counsel.

Plus, the Justice Department said the extent of the information Doumar wanted to review could "implicate national security matters concerning the ongoing war, potential intelligence in the possession of a captured enemy combatant and decision-making with respect to the appropriate facilities for detaining captured enemy combatants." The Taleban was toppled as Afghanistan's rulers amid a US-led military campaign prompted by the Sept. 11 attacks.

Numerous Taleban and Al-Qaeda fighters captured were taken to US Navy base at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba for interrogation.

After US officials discovered that Hamdi had been born in Louisiana, he was moved to Norfolk, Virginia from the base in Cuba. His parents returned from the United States to Saudi Arabia when he was a young child.

The federal appeals court in July reversed an earlier ruling by Doumar allowing Hamdi to meet privately with public defender Frank Dunham, and sent the case back to the judge for more proceedings.

The Justice Department also asked Doumar to stay the deadline to allow an appeal to be filed. The deadline is to expire today.