US:Guantánamo Bay inmate David Hicks is expected to return to Australia to serve out a sentence after he pleaded guilty to offering material support of terrorism, writes Denis Stauntonin Washington.
Hicks's conviction is the first of any Guantánamo detainee and it followed an extraordinary legal spectacle, with a military judge barring two of his lawyers from representing him.
Hicks's remaining lawyer, marine major Michael D Mori accused the judge, Col Ralph H Kohlmann, of bias.
Hicks, a 31-year-old former kangaroo skinner, was picked up by Northern Alliance fighters and handed over to US forces as he tried to leave Afghanistan in a taxi in December 2001.
He was flown to Guantánamo a month later.
He pleaded guilty to the charge of staying in an al-Qaeda training camp and receiving training in kidnapping and urban fighting.
Prosecutors have said that Hicks never shot at Americans in Afghanistan, but that he had taken part in other activities, including collecting intelligence on the American embassy there.
Hicks was left with only one military lawyer when civilian criminal defence lawyer Joshua Dratel was barred from participating because he refused to promise to adhere to procedural rules that had yet to be defined.
"I can't sign a document that provides a blank cheque on my ethical obligations. You can't make it an all-or-nothing proposition. I can't buy a pig in a poke," Mr Dratel said.
Col Kohlmann also declined to approve a second civilian lawyer, Rebecca Snyder, on the grounds that she is a Pentagon employee and commission rules allowed civilians only if their representation incurred no expense to the US government.
Mr Dratel said as he left the courtroom that it was clear that the new rules for trying Guantánamo inmates were as bad as those that had been struck down by the supreme court.
"You cannot predict from one day to the next what the rules are," he said.
Maj Mori said that some of the judge's rulings seemed aimed at helping the government prove its case against Hicks. He said some rulings appeared to be "fixing the rules to fix their mistakes".
Hicks's father said yesterday that his son pleaded guilty as part of a plea bargain that would allow him to return to Australia.
"It's a way to get home, and he's told us he just wants to get home. He has been through five years of absolute hell. I think anyone in that position, if they were offered anything, I think they'd take it," Terry Hicks said.