US begins flying Afghan prisoners to Cuba

 



  WASHINGTON: The US military on Thursday began flying al-Qaeda 
and Taliban prisoners under heavy guard from Afghanistan to jail 
at the American Navy base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, a military 
spokesman said.

  An Air Force C-17 cargo plane with 20 of at least 371 
"detainees" being held in Afghanistan departed Kandahar air base 
at about 11 am EST (1600 GMT), Marine Corps Maj. Brad Lowell, a 
spokesman for the US Central Command in Tampa, Florida, said.

  "There were 20" on the plane, Lowell said. He declined to say 
when the first prisoners might arrive at facilities surrounded 
by razor wire at the US Navy Base at Guantanamo Bay.

  US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told reporters that major 
security precautions were being taken in moving the prisoners, 
including hard-line, anti-Western followers of fugitive 
guerrilla leader Osama Bin Laden.

  Lowell said some small-arms fire was directed at US troops on 
the Kandahar base after the aircraft took off in the early 
evening Afghanistan time, but that the C-17 was not fired upon. 
No injuries were reported as a result of the gunfire, which came 
from outside the base, he added.

  "The aircraft had departed earlier when the Marines at the 
operating base received fire. At no time was that aircraft in 
any danger. It did not perform any evasive maneuvers," Lowell 
said.

  Marines dealing with Kandahar threat: "The Marines there are in 
the process of dealing with that threat. Our initial reports 
have no injuries."

  A US Marine spokesman in Kandahar told CNN late on Thursday that 
the gunfire came from snipers that penetrated the outer 
perimeter of the base and was not believed to be linked to the 
transfer of prisoners.

  "These were two isolated incidents, in that the detainee 
movement was something that we did not get official notification 
that we were going to do until this morning," Lt. James Jarvis 
said. "I don't believe that it is going to affect our transfer 
of detainees because, quite simply, we have adequate security 
for that."

  In Washington, US defense officials earlier said that 
unprecedented security -- including chains and possibly sedation 
and hoods -- might be used in transporting the prisoners, who 
include members of Bin Laden's al-Qaeda guerrilla network.

  One of the officials, who asked not to be identified, said that 
planning called for the prisoners, not yet charged with crimes, 
to be manacled together and outnumbered by specially trained 
guards carrying incapacitating stun guns.

  Others confirmed a report in USA Today that consideration was 
being given to tranquilizing some of the detainees and perhaps 
even covering their heads with hoods for flights that would take 
more than 12 hours.

  The human rights advocacy group Amnesty International expressed 
concern about reports that the prisoners "may be drugged, hooded 
and shackled," saying that they must be treated with full 
respect for international standards.

  "If restraints are necessary, they must be applied humanely, 
with adequate opportunity for the prisoner to move limbs, use 
the bathroom and eat and drink," the group said in a statement.

  Rumsfeld told reporters on Thursday that every effort would be 
made to secure hardline prisoners, many considered dangerous and 
possibly suicidal followers of Bin Laden. The al-Qaeda leaders 
is accused by Washington of masterminding the September 11 
suicide aircraft attacks on New York and Washington.

  "They (military officials) have been authorized and instructed 
to use appropriate restraints. They are fully aware that these 
are dangerous individuals," he said during a press conference 
with Australian Defence Minister Robert Hill.

  'Willing to kill themselves, others': "There are among these 
prisoners people who are perfectly willing to kill themselves 
and kill other people," Rumsfeld added. He provided no details 
except to say that the Pentagon had consulted experts on prisons 
and prisoners.

  The US military has so far taken control of more than 300 
prisoners at a base in Kandahar and others at Bagram air base 
near Kabul, at Mazar-i-Sharif and aboard the Navy helicopter 
assault ship USS Bataan in the northern Indian Ocean.

  The Pentagon refused to discuss details of the transfer, and 
Defence Department spokeswoman Victoria Clarke said on Thursday 
that no announcements would be made until the first detainees 
arrived at the secluded base, where a high-security, barbed 
wire-enclosed facility is being built.

  "What we have done all along is (said) that they are being 
treated humanely in accordance with the Geneva Convention," 
Clarke told reporters.

  The convention sets out the rights and responsibilities of war 
prisoners and their guards.

  Hundreds of US military police and Marine Corps reinforcements 
have been flown to the "Gitmo" base, as it is called, in Cuba 
and prisoners will be held inside a compound ringed by two 
fences topped with razor wire.

  For most of the day they will be held in small cells with a 
concrete floor and chain-link walls, with spotlights on at 
night.

  It was not known if American John Walker, captured fighting with 
Bin Laden's now vanquished protectors the Taliban, would be 
among those brought to Guantanamo.

  The Defence Department has not announced any decision on how 
many of the detainees will be transferred or how many, if any, 
might face military courts martial authorized by President 
George W Bush in the wake of the September attacks.

  Under close scrutiny from civil rights groups, Rumsfeld has been 
studying how such trials could be held while protecting the 
rights of any defendants and keeping tight security over the US 
war on terrorism declared by Bush after the attacks.



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