Australian court orders retrial for terror suspect

AUSTRALIA: A state appeals court on Wednesday ordered a retrial for an Australian Muslim accused of taking money from al-Qaida, saying prosecutors can rely on interviews in which he described meeting Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan.

Joseph Terrence Thomas, dubbed "Jihad Jack" by the Australian media, was sentenced to five years in prison in March for intentionally receiving funds from a terrorist organization and holding a false passport.

But the Victoria Court of Appeals overturned that conviction in August, saying prosecutors had incorrectly relied on an interview Thomas gave to Australian police after his 2003 arrest in Pakistan.

Thomas' lawyers said the process was tainted because he had been threatened with execution and deportation to the U.S. military camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in earlier questioning by U.S. and Pakistani authorities.

MELBOURNE, Wednesday, AP