US Holds More Detainees.

Sixty prisoners - 10 of them youths - on Oct. 10 raised their hands and swore to live a peaceful life at Camp Victory, a major US base near Baghdad airport. In return, US authorities set them free. More than 25,000 Iraqis still in American custody have not been so lucky.

The security crackdown in Baghdad has raised the rolls in US-run detention centres to 10,000 more detainees compared to this time in 2006, worsening already serious backlogs in the court system. Several men being released on Oct. 10 interrupted the judge's speech to complain that they had been held for months, even years, without cause. The judge explained that as long as parts of the country remained dangerous, authorities will err on the side of caution and round up hundreds of men at once, without taking the time to listen to individual stories.

"We cannot investigate every single one of you to get to the truth", the judge told the group of men and boys who sat on wooden benches and wore striped shirts, rolled up trousers and sandals purchased for their release by the US military. The judge added: "Please, I'm begging you. This is the message we're sending to the public. Help us. Help others. Help your families. Work only for peace". (According to US military figures: the average age of inmates is between 35 and 37 for adults and 15 to 17 for youths. About 85% are Sunni, 14% are Shi'ite and 1% are neither. Most remain in custody for about a year. As a gesture of goodwill, the US military pledged to release more than 50 detainees a day during Ramadan. That was what brought the 60 men and several dozen friends and family members to the ceremony in a canvas tent on this sprawling US base west of Baghdad).

About 300 prisoners were released subsequently during a one-day event attended by several Iraqi politicians, including the Sunni and Shi'ite vice presidents. Ashwak Ali Hassan travelled from Dora, a Sunni part of southern Baghdad, to pick up her 16-year-old son who had been held for more than four months. Her husband remains in custody at Camp Bucca in southern Iraq. She said father and son were captured because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time after a US convoy was attacked in their area.

More than 25,000 men remain in US custody at two detention facilities - one at Camp Cropper, near Baghdad's airport and another at Camp Bucca - rounded up for a variety of allegations including acting as lookouts for insurgents, building or planting explosive devices and attacking US forces. Maj. Gen. Douglas M. Stone, deputy commander of detainee operations, says the detainees include some 860 youths, meaning they are under 17 years old and 280 foreigners, including Egyptians, Syrians, Iranians and Saudis. Stone says: "Ultimately, we want all detainees who are no longer a peril to Iraqi and coalition forces to be released".

Stone says about 60 people are detained each day across Iraq. Most detainees are held in limbo where few are ever charged with a specific crime or given a chance before any court to argue for their freedom. Of those who receive a proper trial, about 50% will be acquitted. All prisoners get their cases evaluated within the first three months they are in custody. Then, each case is reviewed every six months. At those proceedings, the review board can release someone for hardship reasons, at the request of the Iraqi or US government or when it determines the detainee is no longer a security threat.

The so-called "pledge programme", which began in July, requires the detainees to take an oath to renounce violence, then they are fingerprinted and they face a fine if they are again accused of wrongdoing. About 1,500 detainees have been released under the programme.

The judge says the new programme is a test "we don't want to fail", telling those being released: "This is going to prove you were not criminals, not terrorists". (The US has been criticised at home and abroad for abusing prisoners and using illegal interrogation tactics which violate the constitutional rights of prisoners. But US officials say foreigners abroad are not generally afforded the same protections as US citizens and the judicial system should not interfere with military operations).

US Commander Says Iran Envoy Is IRGC Member: Gen. Petraeus on Oct. 7 sharpened America's confrontation with Iran, claiming that Tehran's Ambassador to Baghdad, Hassan Kazemi-Qomi, was a member of the Quds Force, the external arm of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corp (IRG). The charge has taken US accusations of Iranian meddling in Iraq's violence to a new level. It strengthens suggestions that Washington is ratcheting up the rhetoric against Tehran in preparation for military strikes against IRGC facilities in Iran.

Gen Petraeus told reporters: "Now he (Qomi) has diplomatic immunity and therefore he is obviously not subject [to scrutiny]". Hours after Gen Petraeus spoke to CNN and Reuters at a US military base near the Iranian border, the US military said it had arrested three members of an Iranian-backed militia believed to be responsible for the kidnapping of five Britons. The Britons - a computer expert and four bodyguards - were taken from the finance ministry in Baghdad in May by gunmen dressed in police commander uniforms without a shot being fired.

Petraeus, who in September told Congress Iran was playing an increasingly dangerous role in Iraq by providing arms to Shi'ite militias, provided no evidence that Kazemi-Qomi was a Quds Force man. The Iranian ambassador has held two sessions with the US Ambassador in Baghdad Ryan Crocker to discuss the violence in Iraq.

Responding to Petraeus' accusations at a news conference, Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini on Oct. 7 said: "His remarks are not new and what he said was in line with the previous accusations against Iran". Tehran denies US accusations that it plays a role in Iraq's violence, as well as Western allegations that its nuclear programme is aimed at developing atomic weapons.

In August, US officials revealed that the Bush administration was considering designating the entire IRGC a terrorist organisation. However, reports in September said the State Department had decided instead to single out the Quds Force as a terrorist entity, which would enable the Bush administration to impose financial measures against the elite unit.

Gen Petraeus on Oct. 7 said he had few doubts about the role of the Quds Force in the violence in Iraq, accusing the unit of supplying material for roadside bombs which had killed US troops as well as provincial governors. He said: "There should be no question about the malign, lethal involvement and activities of the Quds Force in this country".