The bipartisan delegation apparently uttered not a peep of criticism as they viewed the open-air, eight-foot by eight-foot chain-link cages in which the prisoners, some of whom are in their early teens, are kept in shackles. U.S. intelligence operatives interrogate the prisoners in windowless plywood huts. The U.S. government has refused to accord the men prisoner-of-war status and, when pressed, claims to be following the rules of the Geneva Convention in its treatment of the captives.

Referring to the rapid construction of large-scale prison units, the commandant of the camp told the imprisoned men that it "does not mean you will be here forever if you haven't done anything wrong"--a backhanded admission that many are innocent of any charges Washington could dream up. The Pentagon's top lawyer said March 21 that the prisoners are "not being held on the basis that they are necessarily criminals." Lt. Col. William Cline, the deputy commander of the prison camp, recently acknowledged that some are "victims of circumstance" and are innocent.

Often blindfolded and forced to walk in shackles until the steel rubbed their flesh raw, the prisoners have been subjected to violations of their rights, denied legal representation, or not even informed what charges they face. Among the abuses is the taking of DNA samples of every prisoner by U.S. investigators, a fact made known by FBI director Robert Mueller when he visited the camp March 3.

Information on the barbaric treatment of prisoners from Afghanistan and other countries captured by Washington continues to leak out, despite a virtual information blockade.

Camp X-Ray, located on the illegally held U.S. base on Cuban territory, is one of three such hellholes fashioned by Washington. U.S. authorities say they have incarcerated 244 prisoners at the Bagram and Kandahar air bases in Afghanistan, where they await transfer to Guantánamo Bay. Arab newspapers report that among the inmates are citizens of Jordan, Syria, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Tunisia, Morocco, Indonesia, and several Central Asian republics, as well as Kurds from Iraq.

Washington has attempted to justify these brutal conditions and has refused to recognize international rules of law in relation to the prisoners by claiming they are "irregular combatants" and therefore excluded from coverage under the Geneva Convention.

But a rough breakdown of the prisoners at Guantánamo published in the Washington Post shows that of the 544 men held at the three prisons, "Taliban officers from Afghanistan constitute the largest group."  
 
3,000 being slowly killed
Another 3,000 men are being slowly killed in 40 prison cells built to hold 800 people in Shibarghan, Afghanistan. U.S. officials have interrogated the prisoners, who are ostensibly under the control of the Afghan government. But the warden, Gen. Jura Beg, says that no one from the regime has ever visited the prison.

These prisoners are left in the bitter cold day and night. They lack adequate meals, medical care, and sanitation. Beg said he has cut the food ration to the men because of government cutbacks. "We don't have enough food for them anymore. We don't have medicine," he said.

The drinking water "is full of garbage" the warden told a reporter, who observed that "lice have run rampant through the crowded cells." A team from Physicians for Human Rights found an epidemic of dysentery and jaundice.

At a field hospital in Afghanistan an inmate who was being treated was declared "consistently disruptive" because he refused to be shackled. Two soldiers guarding him were so shaken up by the experience that the military brass transferred them from the hospital to the prison camp at Guantánamo. CNN reported that another two at the naval base were transferred to new duties because of "apparent stress."  
 
Military tribunals
At a March 21 Pentagon press conference, U.S. defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld announced guidelines for conducting military tribunals. Rumsfeld presented the regulations some four months after President Bush issued an executive order establishing the tribunals as a vehicle to try "terrorism suspects."

At the press conference the defense secretary and other Defense Department officials indicated that some prisoners could remain incarcerated even if they are acquitted by a tribunal. "If we had a trial right this minute, it is conceivable that somebody could be tried and acquitted of that charge, but may not be necessarily automatically released," said Pentagon lawyer William Haynes. "The people that we are detaining, for example, in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, are enemy combatants that we captured on the battlefield seeking to harm U.S. soldiers or allies, and they're dangerous people."

The rules of the tribunals are stacked against the defendants, said Don Rehkopf, a lawyer in Rochester, New York, who is a member of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. The Bush administration, he added, created "a tribunal that they say is fair, but then they can say, 'We don't like the results and the hell with it, we're going to hold you anyway.' This is a follow-on to their policy of holding people indefinitely before you charge them."

The new guidelines presented by Rumsfeld, noted the New York Times, were "concessions to critics" concerned that Bush's original order "codified a secret rigged system that could simply shuttle defendants to hasty deaths." The president now has won solid bipartisan support for the tribunal regulations, which "were praised by congressional leaders of both political parties as a much improved version," the Washington Post reported March 22.

Conservative columnist William Safire who had formerly denounced the tribunals as "kangaroo courts," said that he and others like him "now feel somewhat reassured." Despite Safire's newfound confidence, however, the military tribunals target workers' rights. The regulations limit appeals by so-called terrorism suspects and give them fewer rights than in civilian trials or U.S. military courts-martial.

Guidelines for the tribunals allow hearsay and other material obtained through "unorthodox" methods that can be used as evidence against defendants. One rule revised from the earlier policy now allows a defendant to see evidence used against him or her. Under "unique circumstances," however, the presiding officer can close trial proceedings if evidence is deemed to be "classified" or "sensitive."

Suspects on trial will be given a military lawyer free of charge; alternatively, they can hire civilian counsel. Any civilian lawyer must be a U.S. citizen and have security clearance to review classified information.

Juries for the tribunals would be made up of three to seven officers appointed by the military. If a defendant is convicted, their appeal is limited to a panel of one military official and two other individuals handpicked by Bush. They have no right to appeal to U.S. courts. A death sentence requires the unanimous vote of a seven-member jury. The president approves the findings and sentencing, giving him the power to overturn a ruling by the jury.  
 
Government raids
Meanwhile, in other developments, federal cops continue to raid homes and businesses of Arabs under the pretext of fighting terrorism. A round of raids began on March 20 and continued overnight and throughout the next day. On the first day, customs agents, guns drawn, stormed into the Herndon, Virginia, home of Mona Abul-Fadl at 10:30 p.m., waking her up as they broke down the front door. They seized three desktop computers, documents, files, diskettes, and copies of an academic manuscript.

"Normally, if one is in that situation, one would call the police," she said. "What police would you call now?"

The same day Abul-Fadl was assaulted, the U.S. Justice Department announced that it planned to interrogate 3,000 more immigrants, mostly from Middle Eastern countries. The department has already questioned 2,261 young men out of the 5,000 on its first list.  
 
 
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