Administration backed by appellate court on detainee

WASHINGTON – A federal appeals court ruled Tuesday that foreign-born prisoners seized as potential terrorists and held in Guantanamo Bay may not challenge their detention in U.S. courts, a key victory for President Bush’s anti-terrorism plan.\nThe U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled 2-1 that civilian courts no longer have the authority to consider whether the military is illegally holding the prisoners – a decision that will strip court access for hundreds of detainees with cases currently pending.\n“The arguments are creative but not cogent. To accept them would be to defy the will of Congress,” wrote Judge A. Raymond Randolph in the 25-page opinion, which was joined by Judge David B. Sentelle. Both are Republican appointees to the federal bench.\nBarring federal court access was a key provision in the Military Commissions Act, which Bush pushed through Congress last year to set up a system run by the Defense Department to prosecute terrorism suspects.\nAttorneys for the detainees immediately said they would appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court, which last year struck down the Bush administration’s original plan for trying detainees before military commissions.\n“We’re disappointed,” said Shayana Kadidal of the Center for Constitutional Rights. “The bottom line is that according to two of the federal judges, the president can do whatever he wants without any legal limitations as long as he does it offshore.”\nA spokesman for the Justice Department praised the decision.\n“The decision reaffirms the validity of the framework that Congress established in the MCA permitting Guantanamo detainees to challenge their detention” through military hearings coordinated by the Defense Department, said spokesman Erik Ablin.\nUnder the commissions act, the government may indefinitely detain foreigners who have been designed as “enemy combatants” and authorizes the CIA to use aggressive but undefined interrogation tactics.