WASHINGTON (CP) - The Pentagon charged a suspected al-Qaida terrorist Friday in connection with a March 2002 grenade attack in Afghanistan that severely injured Canadian journalist Kathleen Kenna.
Abdul Zahir, the 10th prisoner at Guantanamo Bay to be charged, is facing counts of attacking civilians, conspiracy and aiding the enemy.
No trial date has been set before a special military tribunal designed for detainees, where Canadian teenager Omar Khadr also had his first pretrial hearings last week.
The presiding officer assigned to the hear Zahir's case, Col. Robert Chester, is also the military judge for Khadr.
Kenna, who was working for the Toronto Star in Afghanistan and now lives in California, suffered serious leg injuries after a grenade was hurled through the window of her car as it drove from Kabul toward Gardez in the eastern part of the country.
Star photographer Bernard Weil and Kenna's husband Hadi Dadashian, a freelance photographer and translator, were also in the vehicle and were slightly injured with temporary hearing loss and scrapes.
"The Star is pleased that someone has been charged, nearly four years after this terrible attack," said Giles Gherson, the newspaper's editor-in-chief.
"Kathleen is a hugely talented and courageous journalist who is still suffering from her injuries and is on long-term disability."
Her case serves as a reminder of growing dangers faced by journalists in trouble spots all over the world, said Gherson.
"Canadians who rightly demand a high standard of journalism can never take for granted first-hand reports from war zones."
Zahir was arrested about four months after the grenade attack.
The U.S. charges say he worked with al-Qaida in Afghanistan starting in 1997 until his capture, and served as a translator.
In early 2002, American authorities say, Zahir joined others to plan explosive attacks against U.S. forces and civilian foreigners.
He also mass-produced anti-American leaflets and paid members of his terrorist cell, keeping an accounting ledger book detailing money transactions, the charges say.
There are about 500 detainees at Guantanamo. Most were taken from Afghanistan after the U.S.-led war on terror began.
The U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments in the spring that the military tribunals set up by President George W. Bush are unconstitutional.
