We have 15 thousand detainees – U.S. commander

BAGHDAD / IraqiNews.com: A commander of the U.S. forces in Iraq said that the forces currently have around 15 thousand detainees in Iraq, including 160 Arab citizens, explaining that releasing 100 Iraqi detainees on Saturday is the last dispatch before transferring the rest of them to the Iraqi authorities. “The detainees’ folders will be transferred to the Iraqi authorities in a process that coincides with the implementation of the Iraqi-U.S. security pact on January 1, 2008 ,” the Admiral told IraqiNews.com. “My forces will demand that the Iraqi government release those detainees in dispatches after their cases are examined by the Iraqi side,” he said. MH (P)/SR 1