Afghan detainees stuck in limbo

KABUL, Afghanistan, April 13 (UPI) -- Afghan citizens returning home from the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, face lengthy trials with no jury or adequate defense, critics say.

The United States in 2006 began transferring detainees to the custody of the Afghan government in an attempt to reduce the population and ultimately close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay.

Several detainees are held in the high-security wing of Afghanistan's Pul-i-Charki prison and sit for months without charge, The Washington Post reported Sunday.

Twenty detainees in early 2008 sewed their mouths shut with wire and staged a hunger strike to protest their lack of judicial review.

Zalmay Rasul, an Afghan official charged with detainee affairs, told the Post the legal system in Afghanistan is "not perfect" but noted the issue is, in part, due to the lack of a judicial infrastructure following decades of conflict.

U.S. and Afghan legal experts say the legal process for detainees in Afghanistan follows the process for detainees at Guantanamo Bay, which many critics says violates international law.

"The Afghans are essentially rubber-stamping what the occupiers of their country are suggesting," said one opponent.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai in February appointed seven Afghan officials to expedite the legal procedures for the detainees transferred from Guantanamo Bay.