SANAA, 5 August 2004 — A defense lawyer for militants charged with carrying out the October 2000 bombing of the US destroyer Cole urged a court yesterday to free his clients on bail or transfer them to a different jail.
During the sixth hearing in the case, Abdul Aziz Al-Samawi asked the Sanaa court to release on bail the five defendants in custody. The sixth and chief suspect, Abdel Rahim Al-Nashiri, is being tried in absentia.
Samawi also renewed a demand that the defendants be moved to the central prison in the Yemeni capital from the jail of the intelligence service where they are currently being held.
The judge postponed a decision on this and the defense team’s other demand — that it be given a copy of the documents related to the case — to the next hearing, set for Aug. 11.
One of the defense lawyers, Khaled Al-Anzi, was expelled by Judge Najib Qadiri at the last hearing on July 28 after he told the court he was appealing the verdict even before it was out.
Anzi was responding to the court’s refusal to give the defense team a copy of the documents, allowing them only to look at the file. But Judge Qadiri said his questioning of the integrity of the justice system was an affront to the court.
Samawi yesterday scoffed at the prosecution’s claim that the explosives-laden boat which rammed into the USS Cole during the attack, killing 17 American sailors, had been brought from Saudi Arabia.
“Tens of thousands of boats can be found in ports along Yemen’s coast from east to west, and they (accused) could have bought any of those without going through the trouble of bringing a boat from Saudi Arabia,” he said.
Two witnesses who took the stand yesterday did not recognize any of the defendants, prompting Samawi to repeat that the court should acquit his clients.
The families of the American sailors killed in the attack in the southern port city of Aden have mandated the US Embassy in Sanaa to represent them during the trial.
Yemen’s public prosecutor has issued an arrest warrant for Nashiri, a Yemeni citizen born in Saudi Arabia, who was arrested in the United Arab Emirates in October 2002 and handed over to the United States.
He was described at the time as chief of naval operations for the Al-Qaeda network and its operations chief in the Gulf.
Nashiri is also suspected of involvement in attacks against the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in August 1998 that killed 224 people.
He is likewise a suspect in the October 2002 attack on the French supertanker Limburg off southern Yemen that killed a Bulgarian crew member and wounded 12 more.
Nashiri and the five others were charged on July 7 with carrying out the Cole bombing and membership of Al-Qaeda.
