Panel Ignored Evidence on Detainee -WP pgA01

A military tribunal determined last fall that Murat Kurnaz, a German national seized in Pakistan in 2001, was a member of al Qaeda and an enemy combatant whom the government could detain indefinitely at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

The three military officers on the panel, whose identities are kept secret, said in papers filed in federal court that they reached their conclusion based largely on classified evidence that was too sensitive to release to the public.

In fact, that evidence, recently declassified and obtained by The Washington Post, shows that U.S. military intelligence and German law enforcement authorities had largely concluded there was no information that linked Kurnaz to al Qaeda, any other terrorist organization or terrorist activities.

In recently declassified portions of a January ruling, a federal judge criticized the military panel for ignoring the exculpatory information that dominates Kurnaz's file and for relying instead on a brief, unsupported memo filed shortly before Kurnaz's hearing by an unidentified government official.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A3868-2005Mar26.html

The man has been incarcerated at least since January 02

Hopefully the WaPo sends the documents to this guy's lawyers (that's assuming this guy is allowed to have lawyers).

but the guy's still locked up.

snip>
Azmy, Kurnaz's attorney, said reading the classified records at first "exhilarated" him, because they corroborated his client's account. Now that Kurnaz remains detained and some of the information about his case can come to light, Azmy said he is deeply disturbed at what he calls the government's "whitewash."

"No American could possibly understand why we are holding someone we know we don't need to hold," said Azmy, a professor at Seton Hall University School of Law in New Jersey. "Having concluded long ago that he has no links to terrorists, what is keeping him there?"

Azmy said the Pentagon seems unable to admit it was wrong to detain someone so long. "Or perhaps it's just a bureaucratic trap that Murat cannot get out of," Azmy said.

Justice Department lawyers told Azmy last week that the information may have been improperly declassified and should be treated in the foreseeable future as classified.

Sounds as if this is a beginning of a situation similiar to the Sibel Edmonds situation. Hasn't she been fighting the government saying they improperly declassified her file for the last two years?