THE Pentagon has announced that it will seek charges that carry the death penalty against a Saudi Arabian accused of plotting the terrorist attack on USS Cole in 2000 that killed 17 sailors.

Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, allegedly the al-Qaeda chief for the Arabian peninsula before his capture in 2002, faces charges of murder, conspiracy, treachery and five other terrorist-related acts if the proposed case is approved by the civilian head of the Guantanamo war crimes tribunal.

Nashiri was one of three suspects interrogated through the controversial technique known as waterboarding while secretly held abroad by the CIA, the agency's director, Michael Hayden, told the US Congress in February. The procedure simulates drowning and has been deemed torture by human rights advocates and US allies. Military interrogators and FBI agents have renounced its use.