American professor says arrest is unlawful

A Palestinian university professor being held in solitary confinement on terrorism charges in Florida has urged a federal judge to throw out his case, saying it amounted to a "thoughtless slaughter of First Amendment rights" and sought to criminalise him solely for his political beliefs.

The motion, filed by Sami al-Arian, is the latest twist in a tormented case that has pitted free-speech advocates and fellow academics against pro-Israeli terrorism experts and the local media on Florida's Gulf Coast, who have waged a campaign against Mr al-Arian for years.

A court ruled in 2000 that Mr al-Arian - a computer science professor at Florida State University in Tampa and founder of a political think-tank - had no links to Palestinian groups espousing violence.

But after the 11 September attacks prosecutors were granted access to thousands of hours of surveillance tapes collected by US intelligence. In February, Mr al-Arian was indicted on charges that he was the chief North American pointman for Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

He was fired from his job, denied bail and placed in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day pending a trial that is not due to start until 2005 at the earliest.

Amnesty International and others have denounced the terms of his detention, saying they are tantamount to a presumption of guilt before trial.

Mr al-Arian said the prosecutors had no understanding of Middle East politics. "It is clear that the express purpose of the indictment is to chill any support for the Palestinian cause and any additional advocacy in favour of the rights of Arabs," he wrote. "By telling only half of the story of the Middle East to the grand jury and by basing an indictment for racketeering on one side of the story, the government seeks to criminalise the conduct of those who disagree with it."