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Washington: Attorney General Michael Mukasey said Friday the Supreme Court ruling on Guantanamo detainees would not affect the trials of enemy combatants. A divided court ruled decided suspected terrorists have the right to go to federal court to seek their release from indefinite detention.
Thursday's much-anticipated 5-to-4 ruling was the third time the justices have repudiated Bush on his ambitious and hugely controversial schemes to hold the suspects outside the protections of U.S. law.
Speaking at a Group of Eight meeting of justice and home affairs ministers in Tokyo, Mukasey said, "I'm disappointed with the decision, in so far as I understand that it will result in hundreds of actions challenging the detention of enemy combatants to be moved to federal district court."
He added: "I think it bears emphasis that the court's decision does not concern military commission trials, which will continue to proceed. Instead it addresses the procedures that the Congress and the president put in place to permit enemy combatants to challenge their detention."
He said the Justice Department would comply with the ruling while studying the decision and "whether any legislation or any other action may be appropriate."
The court has ruled twice previously that people held at Guantanamo without charges can go into civilian courts to ask that the government justify their continued detention. Each time, the administration and Congress, then controlled by Republicans, changed the law to try to close the courthouse doors to the detainees.
The court specifically struck down a provision of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 that denies Guantanamo detainees the right to file petitions of habeas corpus. Habeas corpus is a centuries-old legal principle, enshrined in the Constitution, that allows courts to determine whether a prisoner is being held illegally.
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