14,000 Held In Overseas U.S. Prisons

Prisoners From Iraq, Afghanistan Held Beyond Established Laws

(AP)  In the few short years since the first shackled Afghan shuffled off to Guantanamo, the U.S. military has created a global network of overseas prisons, its islands of high security keeping 14,000 detainees beyond the reach of established law.

Disclosures of torture and long-term arbitrary detentions have won rebuke from leading voices including the U.N. secretary-general and the U.S. Supreme Court. But the bitterest words come from inside the system, the size of several major U.S. penitentiaries.

"It was hard to believe I'd get out," Baghdad shopkeeper Amjad Qassim al-Aliyawi told The Associated Press after his release — without charge — last month. "I lived with the Americans for one year and eight months as if I was living in hell."

Captured on battlefields, pulled from beds at midnight, grabbed off streets as suspected insurgents, tens of thousands now have passed through U.S. detention, the vast majority in Iraq. Many say they were often interrogated around the clock, then released months or years later without apology, compensation or any word on why they were taken.

Defenders of the system say it is an unfortunate necessity in the battles to pacify Iraq and Afghanistan, and to keep suspected terrorists out of action.

Every U.S. detainee in Iraq "is detained because he poses a security threat to the government of Iraq, the people of Iraq or coalition forces," said U.S. Army Lt. Col. Keir-Kevin Curry, a spokesman for U.S.-led military detainee operations in Iraq.

But dozens of ex-detainees, government ministers and lawmakers, human rights activists, lawyers and scholars in Iraq, Afghanistan and the United States interviewed by The Associated Press said the detention system often is unjust and hurts the fight against terrorism by inflaming anti-Americanism in Iraq and elsewhere.

Reports of extreme physical and mental abuse, symbolized by the notorious Abu Ghraib prison photos of 2004, have abated as the Pentagon has rejected torture-like treatment of the inmates. Most recently, on Sept. 6, the Pentagon issued a new interrogation manual banning forced nakedness, hooding, stress positions and other abusive techniques.

The same day, President George W. Bush said the CIA's secret outposts in the prison network had been emptied.

Whatever the progress, small or significant, grim realities persist.

Human rights groups count dozens of detainee deaths for which no one has been punished or that were never explained. The secret prisons — unknown in number and location — remain available for future detainees. The new manual banning torture does not cover CIA interrogators. And thousands of people still languish in a limbo, deprived of one of common law's oldest rights, habeas corpus, the right to know why you are imprisoned.

"If you, God forbid, are an innocent Afghan who gets sold down the river by some warlord rival, you can end up at (Bagram prison, Afghanistan) and you have absolutely no way of clearing your name," said John Sifton of Human Rights Watch in New York.

The U.S. government has contended it can hold detainees until the "war on terror" ends — as it determines. "When we get up to 'forever,' I think it will be tested" in court, said retired admiral John D. Hutson, former top lawyer for the U.S. Navy.

In Iraq, the Army oversees about 13,000 prisoners at Camp Cropper near Baghdad airport, Camp Bucca in the southern desert, and Fort Suse in the Kurdish north.

Neither prisoners of war nor criminal defendants, they are just "security detainees" held "for imperative reasons of security," said command spokesman Curry, using language from an annex to a U.N. Security Council resolution authorizing the U.S. presence here.

Others say there is no need to hold these thousands outside of the rules for prisoners of war established by the Geneva Conventions.

[drgoodwin12]

Any goverment must have probable cause to detain any individual for an extented period of time.The Geneva Convention and the Supreme Court both say so.If you were held against your will for 6mths.,not charged and your family not notified ,how would you feel about those who have imprison you? The war on terror must abide by guidlines set forth in the Geneva Convention and the U.S. Supreme Court.These terrorist are no different than the Vietcong who did not abide by the rules of the Geneva Convention or the Nazis(pre Geneva convention)however responding to them in the same manner makes us more like them and recruits more of them.This is slowly becoming a religous/tribal war and can escalate out of control.If we truly want to earn the worlds respect (most of it we have lost0 then we have to abide by the laws.

[JP.]

In the UK we take freedoms very seriously, we have seen our courts of appeal exorcised upon the question "If evidence gained by the application of torture is obtained by a third party that has no conection with the British State is it admisable in a British court"? The question was brought forth by the way that terror suspects have been treated here.

The answer is no, nor should we hold suspects without trial on the order of a politician......but we do. We have thrown away three hundred years of personal freedom in less than five years to aid the fight against terror.
The terrorist is not in Iraq or Afghanistan, the terrorist is within.

JP.

[shirms]

What has happened to the America I believed in? Perhaps it never existed? I was always proud of being an American with its system of laws and separation of powers and a Constitution with its Bill of Rights and Freedom of Religion and Separation of Church and State and the idea that America did not believe in attacking any nation that had not already attacked us. I also thought that our leaders were mostly honest and believed in our form of government. Our leader boasts of his being a Christian and then behaves in a most un Christ-like way. If Jesus were here today he would probably be in one of Bush's secret prisons being tortured for his beliefs.

[cantshutup]

"Fascism should rightly be called corporatism, as it is the merger of state and corporate power" - Benito Mussolini

[sharncedar]

Bush and the other fascists will certainly fall; fascism always does as it is abhorrent to something deep within humanity. But as they continue in power longer and longer, their eventual fall becomes greater and greater. Two years ago, Bush and his torture-loving friends could have silently retired into obscurity, in another two years, it will require trials and public repudiation for the underlings. Another four years, it will require trials and public humiliation for the main players so the nation can officially distance itself from this awful behavior to clean up our reputation. It is not really in Bush's interest to cling to power anymore, in that sense. He can still retire into obscurity and slight disapproval, like Nixon, but needs to act soon to avoid scathing humiliation.

[mac2499-2009]

The actions of the U.S. Goverments on these prisoners will beget nothing more than more violence being perpatrated by terrorist groups. Not only that but it will help create future terrorist. But it seems to me that the people of the United States don't care or don't mind that this will happens by the number of commets posted about this story.

[alphaa10-2009]

The Bush regime fought humanitarian principles underpinning the Geneva Accords all the way-- it is hardly surprising Bush and co-conspirators might express "problems" with such modern and generally recognized concepts as humane and just treatment of prisoners.

Under Sneaky Gonzales and Ghastly Ashcroft, whose labryrinthine arguments on prisoners and other detention issues seem illogical, if not downright illegal, on their face, Bush took the brute force route once again and characteristically confused it with finesse. Bush handled his "prisoner problem" as he does any other major crisis, including Katrina-- simply deny and/or spin it to death, hoping it will go away.

Problems with Abu Graib? "Hey, we've had plans for months to shut the place down." Problems with secret prisons? "Hey, we've had plans for months to shut the place down." Problems with torture? "Hey, we were planning all along to stop it..."

Even members of the party which still maintains some relationship with Bush is quick to point out Bush speaks for himself. After all, Bush is the bozo who said to assembled members of his party, who protested NSA spying, "Stop throwing the Constitution in my face. It's just a GD*&&^! piece of paper!"

[cowboy3231]

This is a no win senerio.. All the values that America stands for are being violated under the proposition that the END JUSTIFIES THE MEANS .. This will create more terriost.. What ever happened to human rights & values ? Are we becoming that which we hunt ? Americans would do well in researching the Spainish inquisitions & how the King justified it .. Those who do not learn from history are doom to repeat it.. No act of violence has solved any problem..

[zeekylord]

With so many in OUR prisons here, maybe we could ship some of our prisoners out?

The United States doesn't torture people - but the CIA and George Bush's administration and co-conspirators do.

Bush and co need to be investigated and if they are found to have directly or indirectly responsible for torture or human rights violations and even war crimes, then they need to be prosecuted - just as we would expect those guilty of those same crimes to be if they were a foreign national.

[emhawks]

As someone said in a previous post,"...the terrorist is within". Sadly enough, how very true. Bush, Cheney & many in their adm. are terrorists. The sooner they are impeached & made to account for their abuses towards this country & it's people, the better off America will be. They have never wanted to protect America or its' citizens. There is no war on terror. I also believe that in the years ahead, it will be proven that Bush, Cheney & other high ranking gov. officials within the adm., were involved in bringing about 9/11.

[tank611]

So the United States is detaining 14,000 people. The insurgents in Iraq have MURDERED,not detained,far more than 14,000 poeple.

Posted by Tank611 wrote:
"So the United States is detaining 14,000 people. The insurgents in Iraq have MURDERED,not detained,far more than 14,000 poeple."

And Bush is responsible for the deaths of roughly 45,000 in Iraq.

God knows how many have been tortured due to Bush's "policies".

[grumpas]

How many of these people are guilty of terrorism? Or are they just victims of an "out of control administration"? People who have had the audacity to question Bush? Bush calls everyone who doesn't agree with him a terrorist! How much longer will it be before we anti-war people start joining them in prisons around the world? How can we possibly try them for anything when the people trying them are as big a criminal's? I posed these questions to my Senator's and Congressman. As yet I haven't gotten an answer. But, I plan on continuing to E Mail them on this subject until I get some kind of an answer.

[ronniehm]

"CBS, the 14,000 thank you." -- janem4

Usama sends his regards as well.

[sharncedar]

"So the United States is detaining 14,000 people. The insurgents in Iraq have MURDERED,not detained,far more than 14,000 poeple."

You seem to be saying it is OK therefore to detain these other people. A common argument of the Fox News types is that we can do these new kinds of behaviors such as torture and denying habeous corpus because "they" are doing it too. By this logic extended we would therefore genocide Germans during WWII, etc. because "they are doing it too". Or order hits on mob figures and kill them without trial, or break into burglars houses and steal their stuff, or abuse child abusers in some gross manner. It is a bizarre logic that says that one is allowed to do anything one's deranged enemies might do. Bizarre reprisal logic like this is common in people who are venting or upset; certainly we don't expect it from national leaders who have responsibilities to law and order.

[trid2bnrml]

It would be "justice", in my opinion, if Bush and company were able to get the bill through congress that says, among other things, that they can try people without allowing them to see the evidence against them, and then BUSH and COMPANY stood before that very same court, prosecuted for war crimes and crimes against humanity under the same laws they pushed so hard to enact!

Then, when that's all over and the Administration criminals are off to prison, congress needs to repeal those unjust laws and write legislation forbidding anything remotely like that in the future.

Then send each of Bush and company a copy of it in their respective prison cells...

Justice Has Been Served.

[ronniehm]

"By this logic extended we would therefore genocide Germans during WWII, etc. because "they are doing it too"."

Actually, by this logic, we would have done exactly what we did during WWII, and we certainly did not genocide Germans. By your logic, we would have lost WWII.

[fredegrar]

"How many of these people are guilty of terrorism?" I think the article quotes some anonymous source as saying 70 - 90 percent of these people had nothing to do with terrorism or the insugency. So, even using the 70% number, that would be around 9,000 innocent people. If just 20% of these people become so angry at their incarceration that they decided to BECOME terrorists or insugents when they get out... that's 1,800 new 'enemies of the US'. Of course, that would imply that we're locking up more terrorists than we're creating (5,000 properly jailed/1800 new problems - through the 'false incarceration' method, anyway). On the other hand, using less conservative numbers would turn that calculation around pretty quick.

[ronniehm]

No doubt people joined the Nazi party during WWII as well.

[ronniehm]

Just out of curiousity, fredegrar, how would your 1800 "new problems" harm us if they're already locked up? And, where did you get your 20% figure? From what I can recall, 0% of Americans held hostage by the other side ever became terrorists, and I'm sure they were pretty angry. Do you think muslims are more likely to become terrorists?

[fredegrar]

Hi, Ronnie. I did use the phrase, "when they get out." I'm just assuming that eventually people who did nothing except get picked up in a raid will eventually be freed. As far as my 20% is concerned, strictly just a guess - I'm betting it's a conservative number, but I could be way off in either direction. Last I checked, thousands of Americans haven't been falsely incarcerated in their own country by a foreign power in quite a while. I also didn't say they'd all become 'terrorists' - that's a pretty loaded word. I'm sure any of these people who do decide to turn to violence will think of it more as 'resisting the foreign occupier' than terrorism. Some might be goaded into using terrorist tactics (targetting civilians) and some may go a more traditional shoot-soldiers-with-guns route (but most, I hope, will go home and try to get their lives back). I'm not willing to say muslims are more prone to becoming terrorists than anyone else, but throwing people in jail for no good reason and keeping them indefinitely, without any sort of explanation, at the very least doesn't strike me as a good way to 'de-radicalize' folks.

[ronniehm]

Well are we keeping them indefinitely or are we letting them out? It seems to me that if we're letting anyone out, we're doing more than we did during WWII. And if you think we're just picking up people at random, you'd have to think our soldiers are just a bunch of complete idiots, because they're the ones choosing the prisoners, not Bush. And if you think the majority of the people we're fighting aren't terrorists, you must think that lot more American soldiers have died than Iraqi civilians, and that's not true. They're terrorists, with all the "loaded" things that go with that word, like targeting civilians. And I still find it hard to believe that 20% of any cuture but muslims would become terrorists or insurgents. It didn't happen during WWII, and even if it did, we'd still be right.

[fredegrar]

By 'indefinitely', I meant 'however long suits us'. That's not necessarily the same as 'forever'. I retract my numeric calculations anyway - when I first read this story there was a quote about 70 - 90 percent of these people being innocent. That paragraph is no longer in the article, so CBS must've been unable to sustantiate it. I'm shocked - unsubstantiated info making it into a CBS news story??