Execution of former serviceman to be broadcast live in the U.S.
The execution of former U.S. Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan, who killed 13 people at the Fort Hood military base in 2009, will be broadcast live.
This was reported by the Reuters news agency, citing a Pentagon representative.
The execution by firing squad will take place on December 3 at the Fort Hood base in Texas. Hasan will be the first convict since 1945 to be executed by firing squad by the U.S. military, Reuters notes. « I like the mindset we had during World War II,» the AFP agency quotes U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth as saying.
The proposal to execute the 56-year-old Hasan by firing squad was put forward by U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, and U.S. President Donald Trump supported it. As AFP reports, in one interview Hegseth stated that Hasan faces «execution by firing squad by soldiers (...), and we will make sure that people can see it, that the execution is public.»
Hasan killed 13 people at a military base in Texas
On November 5, 2009, Nidal Hasan, an American of Palestinian origin, opened fire at the Fort Hood base while shouting «Allahu akbar!» at unarmed fellow servicemen who had gathered for a medical examination. Hasan was wounded by return fire, and his legs have been paralyzed ever since. The military doctor explained his actions by a desire to protect Muslims in Afghanistan from American soldiers.
In 2013, Major Hasan was found guilty on all 32 counts, and after a four-hour deliberation the military tribunal unanimously sentenced him to death. The court considered it proven that the crime had been inspired by the ideology of the Al-Qaeda terrorist network.
Nidal Hasan listened to the verdict absolutely calmly. During the trial he never contested his guilt, refused lawyers and defended himself, although he presented no witnesses or testimony in his favor to the court. The lawyers assigned to him by law against his will expressed the opinion that Hasan deliberately sought to obtain a death sentence. Since then he has been held in a military prison in the state of Kansas.
As the AFP agency notes, after Trump's return to the White House in early 2025, the number of death sentences carried out in the United States has risen sharply. Execution by firing squad is permitted by court in five states.
Source: DW
