ARAB-AFFAIRS - May 15 - Lawyers Seek To Prove Torture In Bin Laden Suspect Case.

Jordanian Defence lawyers in the trial of 28 suspected Arab terrorists seek to prove to a military court that some of their clients had been tortured and forced to confess to links to Saudi dissident Osama Bin Laden. 4 intelligence officers testifying before the State Security Court as prosecution witnesses say the confessions they had obtained from the defendants were "voluntary and without coercion". But 3 of the 4 admit to violations during initial questioning of 15 of the defendants arrested in Dec. 1999. (Since the trial opened on Apr. 20, the 16-member defence team has claimed the 15 were tortured while in detention at the General Intelligence Department and were forced to admit to links with Bin Laden. All 15 - 13 Jordanians of Palestinian descent, an Iraqi and an Algerian - have pleaded innocent. The remaining 13 defendants are at large outside Jordan and are being tried in absentia.)

The military prosecutor, Lt. Col. Mahmoud Obeidat, had charged the 28 suspects of different counts, including possession of explosives and affiliation with "an outlawed group" involved in a "conspiracy to carry out terrorist attacks" in Jordan. The indictment sheet did not identify the outlawed group. But Obeidat tells reporters the suspects were linked to Al Qaeda, or "the base", a terrorist organisation allegedlyheadedbythe anti-American militant Bin Laden. A prosecution witness had testified that one of the defendants had offered him training in military camps in Afghanistan that belonged to Bin Laden - who is on the US terrorist list for the 1998 bombing of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. Jordanian officials have said the 28 planned bombing attacks on US and Israeli tourists during New Year's celebrations. In May 15's hearing, Lt. Muein Shatnawi says defendant Saed Hijazi, "outlined by himself facts on his links with the organised group when I asked him about his relationship with it."