BREAKING News photographer in Iraq accused of insurgent ties

[gateley]

Source: cnn.com

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The U.S. military says it has "convincing and irrefutable" evidence that an award-winning Associated Press photographer is connected to the insurgency in Iraq.

The photographer, Bilal Hussein Zaidon, faces charges in the Iraqi Central Court based on the evidence, Pentagon officials said Monday.

Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell and other U.S. military officials would not say directly what charges he faced. They referred reporters to the Iraqi court system.

Hussein, an Iraqi who lives in the western Anbar province city of Ramadi, has been held without charge by the U.S. military since April 2006, when bomb parts and insurgent propaganda were found in his house after the U.S. military asked to use it as an observation post during an operation.

Hussein was already under suspicion by the U.S. military because he arrived at terrorist attack sites so quickly that they suspected he had advance knowledge of attacks, according to Morrell.


more....

Read more: http://edition.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast/11/19/photographer.detained/

[kurth]

1. Get a rope

How many did he help kill?

[alittlelark]

3. Do a little research on him before you tie the noose.

[Teaser]

5. Hey stinky, how about a trial?

And no, an Iraqi trial doesn't count.

[JackRiddler]

12. At least he didn't travel around the world to murder children.

[alittlelark]

2. He's been under arrest for how long now...?

Something like 19 MONTHS!

[tekisui]

4. Let's see the evidence.

He could be a journalist that needs to be made example of. Stifle the press, arrest the reporters and the stories go away.

[happyslug]

7. Evidence??? And reveal our sources!!!! Never, just hang him!!!!

Don't you believe the people saying he is guilty??? What you think they may be making this up??? How un-american are you!!! The evidence must be kept secret, even form the Defendant, let alone he tells his co-conspirators about our Intelligence system!!! We have to keep the system secret!!! How else do we railroad, oh I mean convict with our evidence guilty people like this photographer!!!

[HuffleClaw]

6. utterly disgraceful

but VERY fucking typical of BushCo., very fucking typical indeed. and what is this crap about 'the U.S military asked' to use his house? suuuuuuuure they 'asked'. this administration has always hated anyone who dared expose their evildoing and bilal had been taking some rather revealing photographs of the horror is the occupation of iraq.

[Old and In the Way]

8. This is read meat for the RW blogosphere.

Held since 2006? How much torture did he withstand before he confessed? Might the facts that he knows his way around Bagdhad and, as a photographer, knows the value of getting real-time war pics, have something to do with his presence at these fire-fights?

[gateley]

9. I'm not sure he confessed - but if he was tortured it's a good bet he did -- who wouldn't? nt

[EFerrari]

10. Another journalist silenced.

Anyone remember Sami al Haj?






Posted October 3, 2006
December 15, 2001, dawned overcast at Pakistan’s Chaman crossing point into Afghanistan, and Al-Jazeera reporter Abdelhaq Sadah and cameraman Sami Muhyideen al-Haj were anxious to get moving. Just across the border, the Taliban had fled Kandahar, their rule effectively ended by a fierce U.S. air and Afghan ground assault. The pair’s assignment was to cover the aftermath.

They wouldn’t get far, as Sadah recalls today. When they presented their passports, a Pakistani border guard grew angry. Sadah could go through, the officer barked, but there was a problem with al-Haj’s passport. The officer produced an English-language notice from Pakistani intelligence instructing border guards to apprehend al-Haj for suspected links to al-Qaeda, Sadah recalled.

Both journalists were puzzled. Several times over two months, al-Haj had crossed Chaman with another Al-Jazeera crew without incident. Just a few days earlier, Sadah and al-Haj had traveled across the border to Spinboldak, where they reported on damage to the main Afghan road from Chaman to Kandahar.

Al-Haj thought there was a misunderstanding. The written order that the border guard produced listed the number of his old Sudanese passport, which he had lost two years earlier. A Pakistani intelligence official identifying himself as Major Nadeem arrived at the border later that day and told the two journalists not to worry. The next morning, Sadah said, the major drove off with al-Haj.

http://www.cpj.org/Briefings/2006/DA_fall_06/prisoner/prisoner.html

[KingOfLostSouls]

11. they hit the motherload here

insurgent propaganda and bomb parts hmmm...

so a book by al franken and some orange juice, lighter fluid, a plastic pipe, thumb tacks, and some cleaning detergent?

"YUP, WE GOT A LIVE ONE HERE!!!" I wonder which genius over at blackwater thunk that up.

[gratuitous]

13. The evidence is "convincing and irrefutable"

You just can't see any of it.

Yeah, I think the American military just might have some credibility issues. Call me a traitor (you wouldn't be the first), but for some odd reason, I would really like to see this evidence, hear how it was gathered, how it has been handled every moment since then and by whom, and see for myself if there are any other explanations for its existence.

[Barrett808]

14. k & r