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But the Attorney General also threatened to send the detainees back to Iraq if the British government and the judicial formula complied until 15 October.
By Charlie Savage
WASHINGTON – Attorney General William P.Barr has said the United States will not seek the death penalty against two infamous British Islamic State detainees accused of playing a role in the torture and beheading of Western hostages, which could allow Britain to present percentage evidence.prosecutors very important to bring them to justice.
The statement, which Barr made in a letter to the UK Home Ministry that the Justice Department published Wednesday, represented a fundamental change in the Trump administration’s policy.This may open the door to prolonged prosecution by the two men, The Shafee Elsheikh and Alexanda Kotey, who were captured through a Kurdish defense force in early 2018 and are detained through the U.S. military in Iraq.
“I am writing to ensure that, if the United Kingdom accedes to our request for mutual legal assistance, the United States will not seek the death penalty in the prosecution that may be brought,” opposing the two men, Bar added.that if, however, they were convicted in a manner or execution, “the death penalty will not apply.”
At the same time, however, Barr imposed a 15 October deadline on the UK government for disputes that have limited his ability to move evidence.If he is unsuccessful at the time, he threatened, the United States will instead put the two men in the custody of the Iraqi government.
“Time is running out,” he wrote, adding, “Kotey and Elsheikh have been detained lately by the U.S. army government in a theater of army operations abroad, and it is not sustainable to continue there for an extended period of time.Final decisions” will have to be made on this matter.”
Elsheikh and Kotey were part of a 4-IS British cell phone that took hostages, some of which were eventually beheaded in propaganda videos, and whose affected were nicknamed the “Beatles” because of their accent.
One of the first to suffer was James Foley, an American journalist who was beheaded in 2014.Diane Foley, his mother, told the New York Times in an email that the progression gave the families of those affected hope that the long limbo surrounding the factor never came to trial can be resolved, although they also distrust the brief delay.
“We have high hopes that this guarantee will allow the Minister of the Interior to have a full interaction with our Justice Department and gather all our evidence involving Kotey and ElSheikh…simply involved with the tight timing and legal facets of the UK Supreme Court,” he added.she wrote.” But very positive and grateful to AG Barr for agreeing to give up the death penalty to allow the UK a percentage of its really extensive evidence.”
When the so-called Islamic State caliphate collapsed, the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, an American ally, arrested many of its members around the world in wartime.political reasons and security considerations that their own legal systems can result in the release of many members of the organization or a sentence of a few years.
Kotey and Elsheikh were among them. The British government has tried to withdraw its citizenship and made it clear that it does not need to be returned.Trump’s leadership is willing to prosecute them, but then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions decided not to make sure the U.S. would waive the death penalty, despite the objections of four American families whose children were killed across the Islamic State.
Because Britain has abolished the death penalty, such guarantees are sometimes not unusual when the United States works with the British criminal justice system.The British government has suggested to Trump’s leadership to provide them again, but eventually relented and agreed to hand over the evidence.and send officials to testify at the trial to be admissible, if the United States agreed to examine detainees in a civil court that would send them to Guantanamo War Prison.
But Elsheikh’s mother filed a lawsuit in a British court arguing that such an exchange of evidence would be illegal, which indefinitely delayed the transfer, and the factor was plunged into the dispute.In March, the British Supreme Court first took sides.with him and prevented the government from sharing evidence and offering assistance in the case, the dispute continues.
The court order means that lately the British government cannot transfer evidence to the United States, despite its replacement of a position on the death penalty, but in a statement, a representative of Interior Minister Priti Patel advised cautious adoption of development.
“The UK government’s priority has been at all times to protect national security and to do justice to victims and their families,” he said.”We continue to work intensively with foreign partners to ensure that those who have committed crimes in Daesh’s call “– some other call to the Islamic State — ” are brought to justice.”
Barr’s two-month delay and the risk of sending the men to the Iraqi judicial line will now hold back not only the British government, but also its independent judiciary. The Iraqi option carries several dangers than in the past. led US officials to make it unacceptable.
Iraqi courts issue death sentences that oppose Islamic State suspects after trials lasting only a few minutes, raising human rights objections and not taking the opportunity to expand and provide evidence of what actually happened in atrocities.an Iraqi who delivers a sentence can simply claim that he has no jurisdiction over men, as it is not certain that they have voluntarily stepped on Iraqi soil, in which case they can be released.
The new impetus for the fate of the two men, according to U.S. officials, is due to the Pentagon’s growing impatience, which does not like the headache of having them stopped indefinitely at a base in Iraq.the guard in October after President Trump gave Turkey the green light to attack U.S. Kurdish allies along the Turkish-Syrian border, raising considerations about the stability of his detention.
Last month, the National Security Council convened an interagency assembly at the White House to reexamine options rejected in the past, adding transferring the men to Iraqi detention, taking them to Guantanamo, seeking to prosecute them without the evidence found in British power, and bringing the death penalty to the table to unload that evidence.
The reunion was scheduled some time after the four families published a column in the Washington Post reiterating their call to the Department of Justice to find a way forward with the prosecution of men.They expressed their fear that detainees could escape justice, while reaffirming their opposition to prolonged detention without trial.
“We beg the Trump administration: please, in truth, in justice, order Islamic State suspects transferred to the United States to stand trial,” they wrote.
Stephen Castle contributed to it from London.
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