Sunday, September 13, 2009 WASHIGTON: The Obama administration plans to issue new guidelines meant to provide prisoners at a U.S. detention center in Afghanistan greater latitude in challenging their detention, The New York Times reported in its Sunday edition.Citing Pentagon officials and advocates for detainees at the U.S.-run prison at Bagram Air Base, the newspaper said each of the approximately 600 detainees would be assigned a U.S. military official who would have the authority to look for evidence, including witnesses and classified material, for any detainee challenging his detention.A military-appointed review board would hear the challenges, the Times said. The new policies expected to be announced as early as this week, after congressional review, the paper reported, but it was unclear how quickly they could be implemented. The detainees, some of whom have been held for more than five years, have no access to lawyers, the Times said, nor do they have the right to hear the accusations against them. Only cursory review of their "enemy combatant" status is in place. "We don't want to hold anyone we don't have to hold," a Defense Department official requesting anonymity told the newspaper. "It's just about doing the right thing." More than 600 prisoners are held at Bagram's makeshift prison, where human rights activists say prisoners have been protesting allegedly inhumane conditions in recent months.
BEIRUT: Thousands of people converged Saturday on central Beirut to mark the fourth anniversary of the assassination of Lebanese former premier Rafiq Hariri.Waving Lebanese flags and carrying pictures of the slain leader, men, women and children gathered under sunny skies in Martyr's Square where members of the parliamentary majority were to address the crowd. The rally comes as final preparations are underway in The Hague for the launch of the international tribunal set up to bring Hariri's killers to justice. It also comes as the country prepares for legislative elections in June that will pit Western-backed political parties against a Hezbollah-led alliance backed by Syria and Iran.Hariri died in a massive car bombing on February 14, 2005 that also killed 22 others. The assassination was widely blamed on then Lebanese power-broker Syria, which has denied any involvement. The attack on the Beirut seafront was one of the worst acts of political violence to rock Lebanon since t...
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