http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061001/ap_on_re_as/afghanistan_prisonKABUL, Afghanistan - Capt. Amanullah, a former mujahedeen commander, smooths his black beard with his palm and gives a deep and ironic laugh as he recounts his 14 miserable months in Bagram, the U.S. prison for terror suspects in Afghanistan.
"There were lots of stupid questions and accusations with no proof," said the 56-year-old veteran of combat against the Soviet occupation. He insists he was there only because Afghan rivals lied about him to the U.S. Army.
He's far from alone in his assertion of innocence — or his inability to make that heard for so long. Like many who have passed through the secretive jail set up after the fall of the Taliban regime, Amanullah found himself entangled in a system where he had no protection and no rights, and not even the pressure of public scrutiny that helped inmates at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, or Abu Ghraib, Iraq.
"There's been a silence about Bagram, and much less political discussion about it," said Richard Bennett, the chief U.N. human rights officer in Afghanistan.
Originally intended as a short-term holding pen for al-Qaida and Taliban suspects later shipped to Guantanamo, Bagram has expanded and acquired its own notoriety over abuse allegations though attracting much less international attention than the U.S. detention facility in Cuba.
.... There are US torture facilities like this around the world that no one ever mentions.
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