9/11 attacks 'disgusting', Hicks says

David Hicks has described the September 11 terrorist attacks as "disgusting".
Mr Hicks also acknowledges that Osama bin Laden had some "clout" as a guest speaker at al-Qaeda training camps he attended in Afghanistan, despite his previous denials that he knew who ran the camps.
"I think it was a disgusting act - so many people lost their life on that day," Mr Hicks said of the attacks which killed almost 3000 people 10 years ago.
Speaking on ABC TV's Australian Story, in a special to be screened on Tuesday night, Mr Hicks said it was "hard to describe, when you're watching something like that, that it's even possible it could happen".
"I mean the devastation and the people jumping from the building and when they collapsed and, just, yeah, it was horrible," he said.
Mr Hicks, who was captured in Afghanistan, detained for years by the US in Guantanamo Bay, then convicted of supporting terrorism, admits motivational videos showing terror attacks were shown to trainees in Afghanistan, but says they made no impression on him.
Pressed about his denial that he was aware of who ran the training camps, despite letters home indicating they were run by an organisation headed by bin Laden, Mr Hicks replies: "It can sound like that, sure.
"To take it like that out of the context of what it's placed in ... bin Laden did come numerous times as a guest speaker.
"And he seemed to have some clout because there were many guest speakers, and when he came things were conducted very differently in the camp."
Former Foreign Minister Alexander Downer tells the program: "Well, of course he (bin Laden) came to the camps to speak, he's the leader of al-Qaeda.
"That's what leaders do, they make speeches, he razzes up the troops, denounces the West and denounces apostates. I'm sorry, that's not credible."
In the program, Mr Hicks talks about his childhood and why he embraced Islam and became involved with fundamentalist groups in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
He describes conditions at Guantanamo Bay and explains why he stayed in Afghanistan after the September 11 attacks in 2001.
His claims to have been tortured while in US military custody are supported by an authority on torture, Professor Darius Rejali, who tells Australian Story: "Yes, I think David Hicks was tortured.
"Once you have been subjected to torture you will never be normal, ever. There will always be long-standing psychological and physical effects."