Update on Hicks gag order: Howard Government insists it did not speak to the United States

[dajoki]

Sydney Herald
http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/pm-denies-gagging-hicks-to-stop-election-fallout/2007/04/01/1175366080767.html

PM denies gagging Hicks to stop election fallout
Mark Coultan in Guantanamo Bay and Mark Metherell
April 2, 2007

The Howard Government insists it did not speak to the United States about the sentence that gags David Hicks until after the federal election, even though ministers knew the penalty before the deal on his fate was made public.

Senior Government figures were aware of the nine-month sentence at least as early as Tuesday, the Herald understands, even though it was not announced until Friday.

Asked whether the Government had spoken to the US Government about the length of the sentence or the 12-month media gag order imposed on Hicks, a spokesman for the Prime Minister, John Howard, said yesterday: "No. It was entirely a matter for the Americans."

But The Washington Post reported on Saturday that the outcome was the result of "a highly politicised situation involving the Australian Government". The Post said Australian officials had denied any direct involvement in plea negotiations. Hicks's military lawyer, Major Michael Mori, had declined to answer questions about what influence, if any, the Australian officials had, the Post reported.

At a peace rally in Melbourne yesterday, the Greens Senator Bob Brown described the sentence as a "tawdry" deal. "Of course it's a fix. The message has gone very clearly from Canberra to Washington to Guantanamo Bay: don't allow Hicks to be released until after the elections and certainly don't allow him to speak. It's tawdry, it's despicable, it's a political fix overriding what should have been an Australian justice matter right from the outset."