The US Supreme Court on Monday delayed a decision on whether to take up the case of Ali al-Marri, a Qatari who is the only "enemy combatant" detained on US soil.
Marri has been held without charge in a US military prison since 2003 after President George W. Bush declared him an enemy combatant. The US government alleges he has knowledge of terror plots and trained in Al-Qaeda camps.
"The indefinite military detention without criminal charge or trial of lawful residents arrested and detained in this country represents one of the most extreme -- and lawless -- exercises of executive power in this nation's history," Jonathan Hafetz, a lawyer for the detainee, told AFP.
Marri came to the United States in September 2001 with his family, to study at a university in Illinois.
He was detained three months later by two FBI agents who believed he had information that could aid the investigation into the September 11, 2001 attacks, Hafetz wrote in an opinion piece published in the Los Angeles Times last month.
Two months later, the US government filed charges against him, claiming he had engaged in credit card fraud and lied to the FBI.
A trial date was set for July 2003, but less than a month before it was due to begin, Marri was transferred to a military prison in South Carolina after Bush signed an order declaring him an enemy combatant.
A federal appeals court in July ruled that the US president has the power to keep a terrorist suspect jailed indefinitely, but that the detainee has the right to challenge his detention as an "enemy combatant."
The US Supreme Court has ruled that war on terror detainees held at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba -- which the court considered to be US territory where rights enshrined in the US Constitution must be respected -- have a right to challenge their detention in a civilian court.
