USA September 11 terror: Planner wants to plead guilty

The alleged chief planner of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and other co-defendants will enter into a plea agreement with the justice system and plead guilty, according to the US government.

Chalid Sheikh Mohammed and two other defendants have agreed to such an agreement, the US Department of Defense announced. The exact details have not yet been made public. The further procedure also remained unclear at first. Chalid Sheikh Mohammed has been in the notorious US prison camp Guantánamo in Cuba for many years and, according to US media reports, would escape the death penalty as a result of the agreement.

On September 11, 2001, around 3,000 people were killed in the worst terrorist attack in the United States to date. Islamist terrorists had piloted three hijacked passenger planes into the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon near Washington. A fourth plane crashed in the state of Pennsylvania. Khaled Sheikh Mohammed is regarded as the chief planner of the attacks and is also said to have organized the communication and financing of the plan.

Khaled Sheikh Mohammed was arrested in Pakistan in 2003. He was subsequently interrogated by the US secret service CIA. According to a report by the US Senate, he was tortured during the interrogations. In 2006, he was transferred to the US prison camp Guantánamo. There he was to be tried before a military tribunal for his role in the September 11 attacks. However, the proceedings against him and several co-defendants were delayed for years.

The prison camp is located in Cuba at the US naval base Guantánamo Bay. At times, almost 800 people were imprisoned there. The camp was set up in the USA under Republican President George W. Bush after the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, to detain suspected Islamist terrorists without trial. Human rights organizations have long been calling for the camp to be closed. However, a small number of prisoners are still being held there.