NEW YORK – The five men facing trial in the Sept. 11 attacks will plead not guilty. They would state their criticisms of U.S. foreign policy, the lawyer for one of the defendants said Sunday.
Scott Fenstermaker, the lawyer for accused terrorist Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali, said the men would not deny their role in the 2001 attacks but “would explain what happened and why they did it.”
Ali and four other men are accused of killing nearly 3,000 people in the nation's deadliest terrorist attack. The U.S. Justice Department announced earlier this month that they will face a civilian federal trial just blocks from the World Trade Center site.
Ali is also known as Ammar al-Baluchi. He is a nephew of claimed 9/11 planner, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.
Mohammed, Ali and the others will explain “their assessment of American foreign policy,” Fenstermaker said.
“Their assessment is negative,” he said.
Fenstermaker met with Ali last week at the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. He has not spoken with the others. But he said the men have discussed the trial among themselves.
Fenstermaker was first quoted in The New York Times in Sunday's editions.
Critics of Attorney General Eric Holder decided to try the men in a New York City civilian courthouse. It has warned that the trial would provide the defendants with a propaganda platform.
Dean Boyd, a spokesman for the Department of Justice, said Sunday that while the men may attempt to use the trial to express their views, “we believe the courts and the federal judge may govern the trial. The course of justice will be led appropriately and with minimal break, as federal courts have done in the past.”
1. The five men thought that the U.S. foreign policy should be blamed for the 911 attack.{T; F}
2. Scott Fenstermaker is the lawyer for Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali and four other men.{T; F}
3. Nearly 3,000 people were killed in the 911 attack.{T; F}
4. The press didn't care about this civilian federal trial.{T; F}
5. We can infer from the article that the prisoners also have their freedom to express their own views in the U.S.A.{T; F}