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Protests are planned today to mark the fifth anniversary of the incarceration in Guantanamo Bay of the "Aussie Taleban" David Hicks, amid growing fears for his mental health.
Hicks has been imprisoned without charge or trial in the United States military prison camp in Cuba since the day
it opened in January 2002. He is the only Australian inmate.
A former kangaroo hunter and a Muslim convert, the 31-year-old from South Australia was captured by the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan in late 2001 and accused of fighting for al Qaeda.
He is one of about 400 suspected Taleban and al Qaeda fighters being held in Guantanamo and is expected to be one of the first to face trial, although there is still no clear indication from American authorities when that might be.
There was little sympathy for Hicks among the Australian public when he was first captured.
A drifter with a background of petty crime, he fought for the Kosovo Liberation Front in 1999 in the Balkans, where he was photographed brandishing a bazooka in what has become his defining image in Australia.
A father of two, he was described by released British inmates of Guantanamo Bay as "a tiny white guy no more than five feet three inches (1.6m) tall with a lot of tattoos."
He has variously been portrayed as a luckless adventurer caught up in the wrong place at the wrong time or a hard-core terrorism recruit - "the worst of the worst".
But as the delay in bringing him to trial has dragged on, and Britain insisted that its citizens detained in Guantanamo be repatriated, there is a growing feeling that he is the victim of a gross injustice, whether he fought for the Taleban or not.
There is also concern that the interminable delays in his case have brought him to the brink of mental collapse.
"I live in fear of receiving the phone call that says he's committed suicide," his lawyer in Australia, David McLeod, said yesterday.
"When he was last seen two weeks ago he was despondent and very despairing. He's lost hope and he's refusing to talk to his family. Everything is as bad as it can be for David Hicks. He's the longest-serving prisoner of war in Australian history."
Hicks is kept in his cell for 23 hours a day, with a small window letting in daylight.
Charges against him of conspiracy, attempted murder and aiding the enemy were dropped last June when the US Supreme Court rejected the tribunal system set up by President George W. Bush to try foreign terrorism suspects.
Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer believes charges will be laid against Hicks "within a matter of weeks".
Regulations passed by Congress are scheduled to take effect on January 17, clearing the way for trials to proceed.
In a rare note of rebuke for the US Government, Attorney-General Philip Ruddock and Prime Minister John Howard have admitted in recent weeks that Hicks' case has dragged on too long.
"The acceptability of him being kept in custody diminishes by the day," Howard said.
Hicks' lawyers maintain that his treatment has been a disgrace and that he stands no chance of a fair trial.
"Who arrested him? The Department of Defence. Who interned him? The Department of Defence. Who charged him? The Department of Defence," McLeod said. "Where's the separation of powers? There is none. This has been nothing more than a sham."
Public opinion appears to be swinging behind Hicks. In September a survey found that more than 90 per cent of Australians believe Hicks deserves a fair trial, but less than a quarter believe he is likely to receive one.
His detention without charge has been criticised in recent months by federal Government MPs, judges, archbishops, the head of the Australian Federal Police and the Defence Force's chief military prosecutor, who branded his treatment "abominable".
The opposition Labor Party said yesterday that the Government should press for Hicks to be released on bail and placed under a control order in Australia.
"There's a crescendo building about his case," said Tim Bugg, president of the Law Council of Australia. "It's now becoming a matter of great embarrassment for the Australian Government.
"Our concern is that political considerations have overwhelmed issues of principle which form the cradle of the justice system in this country.
"The Australian Government has abandoned an Australian citizen for political reasons. They should insist that he be released and returned to Australia."
Hicks could not be charged under Australian anti-terrorism laws because they were introduced after the offences he is alleged to have committed.
Hicks was a "minnow in the war on terrorism" and had been sacrificed by the Australian Government in order for it to remain on good terms with Washington, McLeod said.
"His treatment has been appalling, shameful and lamentable," he said.
