9/11 suspects face capital punishment

WASHINGTON: The US military is charging six Guantanamo Bay detainees with murder and war crimes for the Sept 11, 2001, terror attacks on the US.

Brigadier-General Thomas W. Hartmann, legal advisor to the tribunal system ordered by President George W. Bush, announced that 169 charges had been sworn against the six men "alleged to be responsible for the planning and execution of the (9/11) attacks" that killed about 3,000 people.

Among the accused is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the suspected mastermind of the attacks in which hijackers flew planes into the World Trade Center twin towers in New York and into the Pentagon in Washington, Hartmann said. Another hijacked plane crashed in a field in western Pennsylvania after passengers fought the air pirates.