CIA Detained Dozens Secretly

Congress may keep up the focus on the prison abuse scandal following the disclosure that the military has concealed as many as 100 "ghost detainees" from the Red Cross.

The presence of prisoners held by the CIA outside of the military's usual system of registration and care was an important finding of an Army investigation completed last month. Defense officials had previously only acknowledged eight such prisoners.

But on Thursday, Gen. Paul Kern, who oversaw the Army investigation of the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade, told the Senate Armed Services Committee that the number was "in the dozens, perhaps up to 100."

Kern said he could not be precise because he did not have documentation. Maj. Gen. George Fay, who investigated military intelligence officers at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison, said he doubts the figure is as high as 100. "I think it's somewhere in the area of maybe two dozen or so — maybe more," he said.

Senators criticized the CIA's lack of cooperation in providing the information.

"The situation with the CIA and ghost soldiers is beginning to look like a bad movie," said Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.

CIA spokesman Mark Mansfield declined to comment on the number of cases. He noted the agency's inspector general is reviewing the CIA's involvement in detention and interrogations in Iraq. "We take these matters very seriously and are determined to examine thoroughly any allegations of abuse," he said.

The generals and the authors of a separate report on prison abuses discussed their investigations in a series of hearings Thursday by the Senate and House Armed Services committees.

Fay said the Army made several requests to the CIA station chief in Iraq for information about the detainees.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said in recent months that it suspects the United States is hiding detainees in lockups across the globe. Terror suspects reported by the FBI as captured have never turned up in detention centers, and the United States has failed to reply to agency demands for a list of everyone it's holding, the agency said.

Under the Geneva Conventions, the United States is obliged to give the neutral, Swiss-run humanitarian agency access to prisoners of war and other detainees to check on their conditions and allow them to send messages to their families.

At Thursday's hearing, Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., said, "It's totally unacceptable that documents that are requested from the CIA have not been forthcoming" and urged the committee to "weigh in on the issue." McCain said President Bush's nominee to head the CIA, Republican Rep. Porter Goss of Florida, should be asked about the matter.

Sen. John Warner, R-Va., chairman of the Senate committee, said he may hold a hearing on the "ghost detainee" issue.

Meanwhile, a U.S. Army specialist goes on trial Saturday for allegedly abusing inmates at Abu Ghraib prison — the first military intelligence soldier to be prosecuted in the scandal that has so far focused on a handful of prison guard reservists.

Spc. Armin J. Cruz, who was assigned to the 325th Military Intelligence Battalion at the prison, is accused of forcing naked prisoners to crawl along the floor and later handcuffing the men together, forcing them to embrace, said Lt. Col. Steven Boylan, spokesman for coalition forces in Iraq.

Cruz could face up to one year in prison, reduction in rank, a bad-conduct discharge and a cut in pay if convicted during the special court-martial, which will convene in the Baghdad Convention Center in the Green Zone.

Except for Cruz, the only soldiers facing trial so far have been seven low-ranking members of the 372nd Military Police Company, a reserve unit from Maryland.

Fay's report focused on the role of the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade at Abu Ghraib, and identified 27 people attached to the intelligence brigade — both soldiers and contractors — who are accused of complicity in the abuses.

The Fay report assessed the performance of commanders and senior staff officers higher up the chain of command and attributed the abuse to personal misconduct and, in some cases, confusion and inadequate supervision — rather than orders from above or Pentagon policy.

Their findings followed an independent panel's report blaming senior leaders, including Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Richard Myers, for lax oversight of military-run prisons in Iraq.

However, the panel, led by former Defense Secretary James R. Schlesinger, found no policy of abuse and concluded that the problems were directly the fault of the soldiers who committed violence against the prisoners, and their immediate supervisors.

Critics say fault may ultimately rest with White House and Pentagon leaders for creating confusion when they decided in early 2002 that terrorist suspects at Guantanamo Bay did not fall under Geneva Conventions and then sought to redefine longtime rules of detention, interrogation and trials to suit the counterterrorism war.

In a February 2002 memo, Mr. Bush ordered that all prisoners in the war on terrorism be treated humanely and in line with the "principles" of the Geneva Conventions. But he reserved the right to suspend the conventions "in this or future conflicts."

In a memo written in August 2002, the Justice Department appeared to justify the use of torture in the war on terror and argued that the president's wartime powers superseded anti-torture laws and treaties. The Justice Department has disavowed that memo.

Other documents have emerged showing that Rumsfeld authorized guards to strip detainees and threaten them with dogs. Later Rumsfeld issued a scaled back list of procedures — still in effect this year — which includes isolation, sleep adjustment and "false flag," in which interrogators pretend to be from a country other than the United States.