Adam Serwer goes to Guantánamo:
Two weeks ago, Noor Uthman Mohammed sat in the same high-security military-commissions courtroom at Camp Justice, Guantánamo Bay, that was built to hold the trial of Khalid Sheik Mohammed and the other September 11 defendants. Clad in the white garments of a detainee who has had no recent “discipline” problems, Mohammed stroked his gray-flecked beard as the judge, Navy Cpt. Moira Modzelewski, set the next hearing for August. Mohammed’s presumptive trial date is in February 2011, nearly a decade after his 2002 capture in Pakistan alongside Abu Zubaydah. Zubaydah is perhaps best known as the first detainee to be subjected to waterboarding by the Bush administration.
Mohammed is one of the lucky ones. He is, after all, among the 40 Guantánamo detainees getting a trial and not one of the 70 the administration says are “too dangerous to release” but can’t be tried. His lawyers — while frustrated with the pace of the proceedings — are nonetheless relieved by the changes made to the military commissions.
