Judge bans US shooting suspect's Taliban defence

A military judge will not allow a US Army psychiatrist to tell jurors that he shot soldiers at a Texas military post to protect Taliban leaders in Afghanistan.
The judge said today that Maj Nidal Hasan's "defence of others" strategy fails as a matter of law.
Col Tara Osborn said no soldiers at the Texas Army post on November 5, 2009, posed an immediate threat to anyone in Afghanistan. She said the legitimacy of the Afghanistan war is not an issue at Hasan's trial, which hasn't started.
Hasan is an American-born Muslim. He faces the death penalty or life without parole if convicted in the rampage at Fort Hood that left 13 dead and nearly three dozen wounded.