-Caveat Lector- http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/news/news-attack-detained.html
Hundreds of Arabs Still Detained in U.S. Jails By REUTERS Filed at 1:48 p.m. ET March 13, 2002 MIAMI (Reuters) - Six months after the attack on the World Trade Center, hundreds of Arabs remain detained in U.S. prisons and the net has widened to include asylum seekers, some women and children who fled persecution in the Middle East, human rights advocates say. The Justice Department has refused to issue a list of those detained or give a full accounting of the number. In its most recent statement on Feb. 15, it said there were 327 individuals detained on immigration violations or being investigated for ''possible terrorist connections.'' But that did not include those being held under sealed indictments or as material witnesses, a number, which the Justice Department will not divulge, or the asylum seekers. ``We have absolutely no idea how many they have behind bars and neither does anybody else because the government simply will not tell us,'' said Hussein Ibish of the Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee. James Zogby, chairman of the Arab American Institute, said he believed the 327 number were those still in custody from an original 1,200 people arrested just after Sept. 11 and the real number of detainees being held today was as high as 2,000. ``People released from the various detention centers tell us there are huge numbers of Arabs being held,'' he said. The American Civil Liberties Union and 15 other organizations filed a lawsuit last December seeking the disclosure of basic information about individuals arrested and detained since the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington that killed some 3,000 people. The case probably will not come before a judge for another month. Attorney General John Ashcroft has refused to release the names of immigration detainees, saying the disclosure would be ''too sensitive for public scrutiny.'' Testifying Dec. 6 before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Ashcroft said the Justice Department's efforts to combat terrorism were crafted to avoid infringing on constitutional rights while saving American lives. But Zogby said: "Ashcroft is governing by fiat. He says, 'I can't tell you why they are being held or who is being held or where they are. ... Just trust me.' We are behaving like many of the countries we criticize for their human rights violations." When it comes to asylum seekers fleeing persecution, there have been a number of rulings that constitutional protections do not apply to illegal aliens. They can be detained indefinitely while their cases are investigated and have no automatic right to an attorney. ``Asylum seekers are getting caught up in the immigration sweep conducted in response to September 11,'' said Wendy Young of the Women's Commission for Refugee Women and Children. FAMILIES SEPARATED ``The United States is violating basic principles of family unity by separating families already traumatized by their displacement into separate detention facilities,'' she added. Last December, the women's commission interviewed an elderly Christian couple from Iraq who arrived in Miami last August and were sent to separate prisons. They had only been able to meet privately three times and cannot telephone each other. They remain in detention, the commission said. It also interviewed an Iranian Christian woman who arrived last March with her two teen-age sons. They originally joined family members in Tampa but were arrested at the end of September 2001. The commission said the eldest son, who had turned 18, was sent to prison, while the mother and other son were detained in a hotel room. All three remain in detention, unable to post bond. Abdul Salam Amin, a Kurd from northern Iraq who was active in the opposition to Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and twice imprisoned, has been held at the Krome immigrant detention center just outside Miami since arriving last August. His brother won political asylum in May 1999 and is living and working as a baker in Denver, Colorado. Amin was investigated by the CIA and FBI months ago and had an immigration hearing more than two months ago. Now he just waits in an overcrowded prison, the commission said. ``When another nationality arrives in the prison from China or Albania, they stay here a couple of days and get released,'' he said, interviewed through a plate glass partition wearing the orange jump suit of a convict. ``I don't understand it. They know Saddam Hussein attacked the Kurds with chemical weapons. Obviously, it's enough just to be a Muslim to be held for months,'' Amin said. ``I try to be patient and respect their decision but always I am afraid. If they send me back, I will die and my family will probably be killed as well.'' The Immigration and Naturalization Service, which is incarcerating Amin, came under fire this week when it informed the Florida flight school where two of the Sept. 11 suicide hijackers studied that their student visas had been approved. Michigan Democratic Rep. John Conyers, who visited Krome last weekend, found it astonishing that ``while the INS is fixated on detaining and rounding up countless Arab-Americans without any justification, it has failed to take basic steps to ensure that visas are not issued to known terrorists.'' <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. 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