An Iraqi judicial committee has dismissed terrorism-related allegations against Associated Press photographer Bilal Hussein and ordered him released nearly two years after he was detained by the U.S. military.
A decision by a four-judge panel said Hussein’s case falls under a new amnesty law. It ordered Iraqi courts to “cease legal proceedings” and ruled that Hussein should be “immediately” released unless other accusations are pending.
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Associated Press photographer Bilal Hussein, the subject of secret court proceedings in Iraq, still has not been told the charges against him, AP president and CEO Tom Curley said Tuesday.
Hussein has been held by the U.S. military for nearly two years as a security detainee, informally accused of working in collusion with insurgents. At his first hearing in the Iraqi court system on Dec. 9, a judge imposed a gag order on the participants. The AP and the U.S. military have maintained near-silence about the Hussein since then.
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March 9 marks three months since a judge in Baghdad placed a gag order on the hearing of Bilal Hussein, the Associated Press photojournalist accused of being a security threat.
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Wired:
The U.S. military in Iraq has imprisoned an Associated Press photographer for five months, accusing him of being a security threat but never filing charges or permitting a public hearing.
Military officials said Bilal Hussein, an Iraqi citizen, was being held for “imperative reasons of security” under United Nations resolutions. AP executives said the news cooperative’s review of Hussein’s work did not find anything to indicate inappropriate contact with insurgents, and any evidence against him should be brought to the Iraqi criminal justice system.
Hussein, 35, is a native of Fallujah who began work for the AP in September 2004. He photographed events in Fallujah and Ramadi until he was detained on April 12 of this year.
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