The first criminal trial of a terrorism suspect from Guantanamo Bay began on Tuesday with prosecutors calling him a militant while the defence said he was a naive associate of extremists who bombed US embassies.
The trial of Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani at Manhattan federal court is seen as a test of US President Barack Obama's approach to handling some of the 174 suspected extremists held at Guantanamo Bay military prison in Cuba, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, accused mastermind of the September 11 attacks.
Ghailani, 36, is a Tanzanian charged with conspiring with Islamic militants to bomb the US embassies in Tanzania and Kenya on August 7, 1998, in which 224 people were killed. He faces life in prison if convicted. In opening statements, defence attorney Steve Zissou said Ghailani, who was 22 at the time of the bombings, was "immature trusting, naive, a creature of his surroundings" was "duped, innocently, to provide assistance in these attacks." Zissou said that Ghailani, unlike his friends who had become militants, was "still watching cartoons."