19 Acquited of Plotting Attacks
During their trial the defense lawyer made the same point. The defendants admitted in court to going to Iraq to attack Iraqi and coalition forces, but that’s not illegal in Yemen. They were charged with “forming an armed gang” to launch attacks within Yemen (on the orders of Zarchawi) which carries a penalty of ten years. Yemeni lawyers have noted the Special State Security Court was formed contravining the constitution, and its sentences are often politicized.
A Yemen special court acquitted Saturday 19 men including five Saudis of accusations of forming an armed gang to target Americans and Yemenis in the county.
Chaired by Judge Mohammed Al Badani, the State Security Court said the prosecution had failed to present evidence proving the men had formed the armed gang. However, the prosecutor Khaled Al Mawri said he would appeal.
The families, including Saudi families, of the defendants welcomed the court’s verdict demanding immediate execution and release of their sons.
On February 22nd, 17 of the men were put on trial on charges of forming an armed gang to target Americans in Yemen and also Yemenis in connection with them.On April 15th, the prosecution accused two more Yemenis of having facilitated the entrance of the accused Saudis from Syria to Yemen.
The group was also accused of having received instructions from the then Al Qaeda leader in Iraq, Abu Musab Al Zarqawi, to take revenge for the Yemen’s Al Qaeda leader , Abu Ali Al Harethi who was killed in November 2002 by a CIA unmanned plane.
During the court hearings, the defendants, however, denied forming an armed gang in Yemen and denied that Al Zarqawi ordered them to go to Yemen. But they said they went to Iraq for jihad and demanded the court release them.
Critics say the decision points to the Yemeni president’s bid to win the radical Islamic vote ahead of elections in September.
Several of the defendants did confess to having been in Iraq to fight U.S. troops there and had Iraqi stamps on their passport, the court heard. “But this does not violate [Yemeni] law,” the judge said.
“Islamic Sharia law permits jihad against occupiers,” he said.
Mohammed al-Maqaleh, an expert in Islamist affairs who frequently appears in Yemeni media, described the verdict as a “shock.”
“The judiciary is collaborating with the Islamist extremists and this verdict is politicized,” al-Maqaleh said on the telephone. He said it was another sign that President Ali Abdullah Saleh was trying to drum up support from Muslim radicals ahead of the coming presidential elections.
Saleh has long-standing ties with Islamic militants, who have stood by the administration since the 1980s. They sided with his northern government in the 1994 civil war and the successful battle against secessionists from the secular south.
