US: Soldier who leaked documents aided al-Qaida

FORT MEADE, Maryland (AP) — Military prosecutors say a U.S. Army private aided al-Qaida by leaking hundreds of thousands of military and other government documents to the anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks.

Pfc. Bradley Manning had been charged with aiding the enemy among a total of 22 counts, but on Thursday the military publicly identified the enemy Manning's actions aided. Manning and his attorneys are appearing at a hearing in a military courtroom at Fort Meade, near Baltimore, for two days of hearings in the case.

Military prosecutors say Manning, 24, downloaded and transferred to WikiLeaks nearly half a million sensitive battlefield reports. Defense lawyers say that Manning was a troubled soldier who shouldn't have had access to classified material and that the leaked material did little or no harm to national security.