A US Air Force judge has ordered that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, accused of masterminding the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, and three other defendants be tried in a military court starting June 5, 2028.
The decision is the latest step in a long legal process that has dragged on for more than two decades over legal disputes over four Guantanamo detainees.
At the behest of Michael Schrama, US Air Force Military Judge Khalid Sheikh Mohammed Walid Mohammed Saleh Mubarak bin Attash, Mustafa Ahmed Adam Al-Husawi and Ali Abdulaziz Ali will appear in the trial.
Previously, a plea agreement had been proposed between military court officials and the defendants, which could have saved them from the death penalty, but this agreement was canceled after opposition from a number of Republican lawmakers and on the orders of former US Secretary of War Lloyd Austin.
The US Court of Appeals also last month refused to allow the agreement to be implemented and overturned previous decisions in support of it.
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who remains the most famous Guantanamo Bay detainee, is accused of masterminding the September 11 attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people in 2001.
