By Kristin Roberts
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Pentagon on Monday sought murderand conspiracy charges against the alleged planner of the Sept.11 attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and five others and willask they be executed if convicted.
The charges, if approved by a Pentagon appointee whooversees the war court at Guantanamo, are the first from thatcourt alleging direct involvement in the 2001 attacks on theUnited States and the first involving the death penalty.
Suspects were also charged with terrorism and violating thelaws of war and targeting civilians.
"The defendants will face the possibility of beingsentenced to death," Air Force Brig. Gen. Thomas Hartmann toldreporters.
Mohammed, a Pakistani national better known as KSM, hassaid he planned every aspect of the Sept. 11 attacks. But hisconfession could be problematic if used as evidence because theCIA has admitted it subjected him to "waterboarding", asimulated drowning technique.
The procedure is widely considered to be torture and theGuantanamo court rules prohibit the use of evidence obtainedthrough torture, as does an international treaty the UnitedStates has signed.
The charges against Mohammed will include conspiring withal Qaeda to attack and murder civilians and about 3,000 countsof murder for those killed in the Sept. 11 hijacked planeattacks.
Mohammed also said he was responsible for a 1993 attack onNew York's World Trade Center, the bombing of a nightclub inBali, Indonesia, and an attempt to down two U.S. airplanesusing shoe bombs. He also confessed to the beheading of U.S.journalist Daniel Pearl.
Mohammed was arrested in Pakistan in March 2003 and handedover to the United States. He is one of 15 "high-value" alQaeda prisoners previously held in CIA custody and later sentto Guantanamo, most of them in 2006.
The U.S. military began sending captives to Guantanamo, aU.S. base on the southeast tip of Cuba, in January 2002 andhopes to eventually try 80 of the 275 who remain.
The widely criticized Guantanamo tribunals are the firstU.S. war crimes tribunals since World War Two.
They were established after the Sept. 11 attacks to trynon-U.S. captives whom the Bush administration considers "enemycombatants" not entitled to the legal protections granted tosoldiers and civilians.
They currently operate under authority of a law Congresspassed in 2006, after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down thefirst version.
(Editing by Patricia Wilson and Frances Kerry)
