500 Iraqi, Afghan teen 'combatants' detained
The US military is holding about 500 juveniles suspected of being "unlawful enemy combatants" in detention centers in Iraq and has about 10 detained at the US base at Bagram, Afghanistan, the United States has told the United Nations.
A total of 2,500 youths under the age of 18 have been detained, almost all in Iraq, for periods up to a year or more in President George W. Bush's anti-terrorism campaign since 2002, the US reported last week to the UN's Committee on the Rights of the Child.
Civil liberties groups such as the International Justice Network and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) denounced the detentions as abhorrent, and a violation of US treaty obligations.
In the periodic report to the United Nations on US compliance with the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the US confirmed that "As of April 2008, the United States held about 500 juveniles in Iraq".
"The juveniles that the United States has detained have been captured engaging in anti-coalition activity, such as planting Improvised Explosive Devices, operating as lookouts for insurgents, or actively engaged in fighting against US and Coalition forces," the US report said.
The majority are believed to be 16 or 17 years old. In the US a 17-year-old can enlist in the US army, with parental consent.
The report said that of the total of 2,500 juveniles jailed since 2002, all but 100 had been picked up in Iraq. The vast majority of the remainder were swept up in Afghanistan.
A total of eight juveniles have been held at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility, but all were released from 2004 to 2006.
"It remains uncertain the exact age of these individuals, as most of them did not know their date of birth or even the year they were born," the report says. But US military doctors who evaluated them believed that three were under age 16.
In Afghanistan, "As of April 2008, there are approximately 10 juveniles being held at the Bagram Theater Internment Facility as unlawful enemy combatants," the report said.
In Bagram, a US military spokesman, Marine 1st Lt. Richard K. Ulsh, said on Sunday: "At any time there are up to 625 detainees being held at the Bagram Theater Internment Facility.
There are no detainees being held under the age of 16 and, without getting into specifics due to the frequent fluctuation in the number of detainees being held, we can tell you that there are currently less than 10 detainees being held under the age of 18."
"It's shocking to me that the US government has not figured out a way to keep children out of adult prisons. It's outrageous, and it is not making us any safer, I can say that about Afghanistan from personal experience," Tina M. Foster, the executive director of the International Justice Network, said on Sunday.
The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child is scheduled to question the US government delegation on its compliance with its obligations on May 22 in Geneva.
The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child was adopted by the General Assembly in 1989, with backing at the time from the US government of President Bill Clinton, and with strong lobbying from then first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Agencies
(China Daily 05/20/2008 page23)
