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Guantánamo chronology

November 2001: President Bush authorizes indefinite detention for non-US citizens, without legal protection of Geneva Convention.

January 2002: First prisoners arrive at Camp Delta, a terrorist detention camp at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba; by June, there are 536 detainees.

May 2003: The Defense Department says it will hold special military commissions to try detainees for special war crimes.

December 2003: David Hicks, an Australian who allied with the Taliban, is the first detainee to receive counsel from a US military lawyer.

June 2004: The Supreme Court rules that Guantánamo detainees may challenge their detention in a US court.

July 2004: The Defense Department authorizes special military tribunals to determine if each detainee is an 'enemy combatant.'

November 2004: A federal judge rules that the military commission process set up to try Salim Hamdan, accused of being Osama bin Laden's driver, is illegal.

November 2005: After a government appeal and a ruling in federal appeals court, the Supreme Court agrees to hear the Hamdan case.

June 2006: The Supreme Court rules that the president overstepped his authority in creating military commissions; the administration and Congress respond by writing the Military Commissions Act (MCA),

October 2006: Bush signs the MCA, authorizing military trials.

June 2007: Military judges dismiss charges against Hamdan and Omar Khadr, accused of killing a US serviceman and detained at age 15. The judges state that the MCA draws a distinction between 'unlawful' and 'lawful' enemy combatants; only unlawful combatants can be tried by a military commission.

Sources: National Institute of Military Justice, news reports – Compiled by Leigh Montgomery