On Friday, August 2, the U.S. Defense Secretary revoked the plea agreements reached between the Pentagon and three suspects involved in planning the 9/11 attacks. Currently, these three individuals are detained at the U.S. military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
On Wednesday, July 31, the Pentagon announced that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind behind the “9/11 terror attacks,” had agreed to sign a plea agreement. Additionally, Mohammed’s two accomplices, Walid bin Attash and Mustafa al-Hawsawi, have also accepted pretrial agreements.
The specific details of the agreements have not been made public by the Pentagon. A U.S. official who wished to remain anonymous disclosed to Reuters that the plea agreements almost certainly include admission of guilt in exchange for not receiving the death penalty.
On September 11, 2001, the United States experienced a large-scale terrorist attack, where extremist Islamic terrorists hijacked three planes and crashed them into the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington D.C. Another hijacked plane crashed in Pennsylvania, resulting in nearly three thousand deaths and leading the U.S. into a 20-year-long war on terror in Afghanistan.
The plea agreements have sparked condemnation within the U.S., with families of the victims expressing disappointment and anger over the cancellation of the suspects’ death penalties. Many Republican lawmakers, including House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, have strongly criticized the plea agreement.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin overturned the pretrial agreements signed by the Pentagon officials with the suspects on Friday, choosing to personally oversee the case.
“By the authority vested in me, I hereby revoke the three pretrial agreements, effective immediately…” Austin wrote in a memorandum.
The pretrial agreements were signed by retired Brigadier General Susan Escallier, who was responsible for overseeing the Guantanamo Bay war court for the Pentagon.
Austin’s action effectively reinstates the cases of the three 9/11 suspects as death penalty cases, and the military commissions will proceed with the trial. Ms. Escallier will now be handling other cases in Guantanamo Bay.