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Politics : DON'T START THE WAR -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: thames_sider who wrote (17002)	3/7/2003 11:34:18 AM
From: Mao II	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 25898

Ashcroft Defends Detention of 2 Americans By CURT ANDERSON, Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON - A Democratic congressman told Attorney General John Ashcroft (news - web sites) on Thursday that the federal government's continued detention of two U.S. citizens without charges or access to lawyers is frightening. New York Rep. Jose Serrano (news, bio, voting record) said there is a widely held perception that the detentions of Jose Padilla and Yaser Esam Hamdi as "enemy combatants" are unfair. "You've got to be concerned that these are American citizens detained without charges," Serrano said. Such action is frightening, he said. Padilla, arrested at a Chicago airport, is accused of plotting to detonate a radiological "dirty bomb" in the United States and Hamdi, who was born in Louisiana, was captured fighting with Taliban forces in Afghanistan (news - web sites). They are classified as enemy combatants and are being held in military brigs without access to lawyers. Ashcroft, testifying before the House Appropriations Committee that oversees the Justice Department (news - web sites)'s budget, pointed to jurisprudence, upheld by the Supreme Court, giving the president the power to hold people until hostilities cease and to try them before military tribunals. Court trials could open the government to questioning by defense lawyers that might reveal intelligence secrets, sources and methods, Ashcroft said. "We are aware that this is a matter of serious concern," Ashcroft said. "These are tough issues to be balanced." Ashcroft also defended the government's detention of hundreds of foreigners after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, telling the committee that the vast majority have been deported or left the country willingly. In response to questions from Serrano, the panel's ranking Democrat, Ashcroft said that 766 aliens were detained in the aftermath of the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, mostly for overstaying visas. Of those, 489 have been deported or left the United States willingly. Another 29 are still in custody, of which three continue to be investigated by the FBI (news - web sites) for suspected ties to al-Qaida or other terrorist groups, Ashcroft said. In addition, 108 people have been convicted or pleaded guilty to what Ashcroft called terror-related charges in the 18 months since the attacks. "No people have been held by the Justice Department who have not been charged," Ashcroft said. "No one has just been rounded up." Ashcroft also came into tough questioning from Rep. Patrick Kennedy (news, bio, voting record), D-R.I., over his decisions this year to overrule local U.S. attorneys who had not wanted to seek the death penalty. Kennedy contrasted that with studies he said show that capital punishment is "overwhelmingly" unfair to blacks and other minorities. Ashcroft defended his decisions in the federal cases, saying that his goal is to ensure that the federal death penalty is applied in a "fair and uniform manner" around the country. He said he had little power over state capital punishment practices. story.news.yahoo.com To say Ashcroft is disingenuous is to put it mildly. ___