British Forces to Treat Detainees as POWs

Britain has decided to treat any Al Qaeda and Taliban fighters it might capture in Afghanistan as prisoners of war and turn them over to the interim Afghan government.

British representatives said they lack sufficient ground forces to conduct legal hearings about the appropriate status of individual prisoners. So far, the British have no captives in Afghanistan.

The British decision further isolates the U.S. in its policy of classifying detainees as “unlawful combatants” rather than as prisoners of war. Under the U.S. policy, hundreds of prisoners are in indefinite detention without charge and some may be tried by special military tribunals.