Law of the jungle

Differences once more have emerged among Western allies with Washington seeking the death penalty for a terrorist suspect and Paris counselling restraint, writes Anayat Durrani
The United States will seek the death penalty for Zacarias Moussaoui, the man investigators call the 20th hijacker in the 11 September attacks against America. Moussaoui is the first criminal defendant charged with conspiring with Osama Bin Laden's Al-Qa'eda network to carry out the hijacked plane attacks against the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
US Attorney General John Ashcroft made the announcement last week citing the "impact of the crime on thousands of victims." Ashcroft said the US remained "committed not only to carrying out justice in this case but also to ensure the rights of the victims are also protected."
Moussaoui's lawyer, Frank Dunham, criticised Ashcroft for the public announcement, dismissing it as a "media circus" that only served to "influence the jury pool."
"We don't try cases in the press," Dunham said. "It is unseemly for the attorney general to conduct himself that way. He does not need to have a press conference, which can only prejudice a jury pool, which will make it very difficult to find an unbiased jury."
More than 3,000 people were killed in the September attacks when terrorists hijacked four commercial planes crashing two into the World Trade Center twin towers in New York and one into the Pentagon in Washington, DC. The fourth plane went down in a wooded area in Pennsylvania after passengers were said to have fought the hijackers for control of the aircraft.
Moussaoui, 33, a French citizen of Moroccan descent, was behind bars in a Minnesota jail at the time the attacks took place. He has been detained since August on an immigration violation since a Minnesota flight school reported suspicions to authorities. Prosecutors will seek to prove that had Moussaoui not been in jail on 11 September, he would have been the fifth hijacker of United Flight 93, the only flight with four hijackers aboard. They cite Moussaoui's enrolment at a flight school, his alleged training at an Al- Qa'eda camp, and his alleged receipt of $14,000 from a man who financed some of the hijackers and once shared an apartment with suspected ringleader Mohamed Atta in Germany.
Prosecutors held Moussaoui responsible for "the largest loss of life resulting from a criminal act in the history of the US." Prosecutors will seek to prove that Moussaoui's actions in support of the terrorist attacks were committed "in an especially heinous, cruel and depraved manner in that they involved torture and serious physical abuse to the victims." Moussaoui was indicted in December on six conspiracy charges, four of which could bring the death penalty. In January Moussaoui's lawyers entered a plea of not guilty. His trial is scheduled to begin with jury selection on 30 September in Alexandria, Virginia, despite earlier objections by defence lawyers who said the trial date was too close to the anniversary of the attacks.
Analysts argue that making a case in favour of the death penalty may be difficult for prosecutors considering the fact that Moussaoui was locked away in jail on 11 September. There is no proof that Moussaoui was the intended 20th hijacker before his arrest or any concrete evidence connecting him to the planning of the hijacking plot. There is no evidence he was in touch with or had any direct links with the 19 hijackers or that Moussaoui himself ever committed a terrorist act. US authorities point to Moussaoui's "parallel pattern" of activities with the hijackers in the months leading up to the attacks, such as his receipt of a large sum of cash from an individual who also sent funds to the hijackers. To get the death penalty, prosecutors will need to persuade jurors that Moussaoui shares the same guilt for the crimes of 11 September as the 19 hijackers aboard the planes. Prosecutors have already started interviewing the families of the victims of 11 September and plan to have many of them testify on the impact the attack had on their lives.
Reaction to the announcement that the US would seek the death penalty against Moussaoui has received a sharp response from the government of France, which strongly opposes the death penalty. France appealed to the US two weeks earlier not to seek the death penalty against Moussaoui. France banned capital punishment in 1981. Justice Minister Marylise Lebranchu has said that she does not want any evidence collected against Moussaoui in France to be used to help sentence him to death in the US and that France would "under no circumstances" provide such evidence to US prosecutors to use in court. French Foreign Minister Hubert Vedrine in a statement last Thursday said he regretted the decision by Ashcroft and stated that any evidence from France "may not be used as the basis for seeking the death penalty, in a verdict or sentence to that end." Despite differences on the Moussaoui case, Vedrine reaffirmed France's "solidarity with America's fight against terrorism" and that the country would continue to share intelligence with the US in the war on terrorism.
Despite reaction from US allies, Ashcroft, a long-time proponent of the death penalty, said the US remained committed to its safety and security and would strongly pursue the death penalty against Moussaoui. "We ask our counterparts in the international community to respect our sovereignty, and we respect theirs," Ashcroft said.
Moussaoui's mother, Aicha El-Wafi, spoke out against the US decision to pursue the death penalty, saying her son "has not killed anyone, so I do not see how he is guilty of destroying America or whatever it is." She said her son was being used as a "scapegoat" and that the US government had "found an Arab, a poor person" to take the blame because they "can't find the people who are truly responsible for this crime."
Recommend this page
© Copyright Al-Ahram Weekly. All rights reserved
Send a letter to the Editor