US officials handed over formal control of Afghanistan's only large-scale US-run prison to Kabul on Monday, even as disagreements between the two countries over the Taliban and terror suspects held there marred the transfer.

The handover ceremony took place at the prison next to a sprawling US airfield in Bagram, just north of Kabul. President Hamid Karzai has hailed the transfer as a victory for Afghan sovereignty.

Bagram, also known as the Parwan Detention Facility, has been the focus of controversy in the past but never had the notoriety of the prisons at Guantanamo Bay or Abu Ghraib in Iraq.

Earlier this year, the image of the prison was tarnished when hundreds of Qurans and other religious materials were taken from its library and sent to a burn pit at the military base. The event triggered scores of deadly anti-American protests across Afghanistan and led to the deaths of six US soldiers.

The US had already given Afghanistan authority over most of the 3,000 detainees held at the prison before March 9, when the countries signed a handover agreement. As some may have been released or others brought in, the prison's current detainee population under US control is not known but is thought to number in the hundreds.

The US recently suspended the transfer of new detainees apparently because of disagreements with Kabul, which has questioned the long-term detention of suspects without charge after their capture.

The US reportedly fears that Afghan authorities may simply let some detainees go, and appears reluctant to turn over all the suspects it holds.

According to Afghan army Gen. Ghulam Farouk, the United States had transferred 3,082 detainees but was still in the process of transferring another 600 captured after the March agreement. The US will also continue to hold about 50 non-Afghan prisoners that are not covered by the agreement on a small part of the facility that they will still administer. They are thought to include Pakistanis and other foreign nationals either captured in Afghanistan or transferred to Bagram from other wars, such as Iraq.

The disagreement is not expected to impact military operations around Afghanistan, but it is an indication of the tense relations between the US-led NATO military coalition and Afghan President Hamid Karzai.

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Editor's Note: How many times have we seen detainees released only to have them show up on the battlefields to shoot at our soldiers?!...


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