monday reads

Defying U.S. Plan, Prison Expands in Afghanistan

But almost a year after the Afghan detention center opened, American officials say it can hold only about half the prisoners they once planned to put there. As a result, the makeshift American site at Bagram will probably continue to operate with hundreds of detainees for the foreseeable future, the officials said.

Meanwhile, the treatment of some prisoners on the Bagram base has prompted a strong complaint to the Pentagon from the International Committee of the Red Cross, the only outside group allowed in the detention center.

In a confidential memorandum last summer, the Red Cross said dozens of prisoners had been held incommunicado for weeks or even months in a previously undisclosed warren of isolation cells at Bagram, two American officials said. The Red Cross said the prisoners were kept from its inspectors and sometimes subjected to cruel treatment in violation of the Geneva Conventions, one of the officials said.

Paul Krugman: From Hype to Fear


Taylor war crimes trial restarts

The trial of the former Liberian president Charles Taylor was reopened today, six months after the dictator boycotted the opening session.

Taylor, the first former African leader to face an international court, is accused of orchestrating war crimes committed by militias during Sierra Leone's civil war.

The 59-year-old faces 11 charges, including murder, rape, enslavement and conscription of child soldiers.

He is also accused of forming a "joint criminal enterprise" by giving Sierra Leonean rebel groups weapons and training in return for access to the country's diamonds.

George McGovern: As we enter the eighth year of the Bush-Cheney administration, I have belatedly and painfully concluded that the only honorable course for me is to urge the impeachment of the president and the vice president.