A military judge is clearing the way for a member of the team that raided Osama bin Laden’s compound to testify in the trial of an Army private charged in a massive leak of U.S. secrets.

Col. Denise Lind ruled for the prosecution during a pretrial hearing for Pfc. Bradley Manning Tuesday at Fort Meade, near Baltimore.

The government says the witness, presumably a Navy SEAL, collected digital evidence showing that an associate of bin Laden provided the al-Qaida leader with documents Manning has acknowledged sending to the WikiLeaks website.

Defense attorneys had argued that proof of receipt isn’t relevant to whether Manning aided the enemy.

The judge disagreed. She said the government must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that intelligence was both given to and received by the enemy.

(AP)