NATIONAL SECURITY — JUDGE ADMITS CONFESSION EXTRACTED BY THREATENING A DETAINEE WITH GANG RAPE: In the first full war crimes tribunal of the Obama administration, a military judge held that a detainee, who confessed to killing an American soldier after he was threatened with being gang-raped to death if he did not cooperate, may nonetheless have that confession used against him at trial. Omar Khadr faced interrogation by U.S. Army Sgt. Joshua Claus, who testified in May hearings that he threatened Khadr with being gang-raped. Sgt. Claus has since been convicted of abusing a different detainee and has left the military, but nevertheless, military judge Col. Patrick Parrish allowed the confession to be used during Khadr’s tribunal. Khadr’s trial is controversial to begin with — he was only 15 years old at the time of his capture and confession, earning his tribunal a strong condemnation from the United Nations. In the words of the U.N., “Juvenile justice standards are clear. Children should not be tried before military tribunals.” Other proceedings are also underway at Guantanamo — yesterday, a military jury handed an al-Qaeda cook a 14-year sentence. There is reportedly a plea deal that will send the man home much earlier, but the details have not been officially disclosed. Human Rights Watch observer Andrew Prasow slammed those proceedings, saying, “The fact that the actual plea agreement is secret calls into question how open and transparent these proceedings really are.” The Pentagon has been offering journalists tours of the base several times per month to clear up “common misrepresentations” and promote transparency, but in a story today titled, “Tours of Guantanamo Offers a Look, but Little Else,” the paper reported the information journalists receive is mostly useless.