Mastermind of 9/11 attacks to be arraigned today

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Mastermind of 9/11 attacks to be arraigned today

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The self-confessed mastermind of the 9/11 attacks and 4 co-accused were due to be arraigned today.

05 May,2012 09:38 am

All five of the plotters are said to face death penalty if convicted at Guantanamo Bay.Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his co-defendants will be formally charged in a military tribunal with planning and executing the September 11, 2001 attacks that killed 2,976 people in New York, Washington and Shanksville, Pennsylvania.One of the last steps before the so-called trial of the century takes place, the arraignment marks the second time the United States has tried to prosecute the 9/11 suspects.It comes more than a decade after the most lethal attacks on US soil in modern history, and just about one year after President Barack Obama ordered the US Navy SEALs raid that killed the man behind it all -- Osama bin Laden.Mohammed will appear in the military tribunal along with Ramzi Binalshibh of Yemen, Mohammeds Pakistani nephew Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali -- also known as Ammar al-Baluchi -- Walid bin Attash and Mustapha al-Hawsawi of Saudi Arabia.The five have been held for years at the US-run prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, while a legal and political battle has played out over how and where to prosecute them -- and debates have raged over how they were treated.It has been nine years since Mohammeds 2003 arrest, three of which he spent in secret CIA jails, confessing to a series of attacks and plots after being subjected to harsh interrogations, including waterboarding, denounced by rights groups as torture.