US fights with books

US troops are holding almost 800 children and teenagers on a Baghdad base, largely illiterate boys picked up for planting bombs

In orange jumpsuits reminiscent of the uniforms of terror suspects held at Guantanamo Bay, the youngsters aged 10-17 attend a US-run school seven days a week, eight hours a day, in order to mend their ways.

The young boys are the focus of a multi-million-dollar education project.

Equipped with four football pitches, 18 classrooms and a library, the school is stocked with TV sets, DVDs, Harry Potter in Arabic, text books, white boards, rows of desks and chairs, and hot lunches.

Barefoot on the stony sports field, trousers rolled to their knees and kicking a ball around, they shriek with delight as US soldiers stand watch from a guard tower next to giant blast walls.

Game over, baton-wielding US troops order their 8220;juvies8221; to squat, hands on head before frogmarching them to their next lesson.

Inside, soldiers stand with pepper spray ready, sunglasses clamped on heads, keeping watch as civillian Iraqi teachers try to instill basic grammar and arithmetic into teens who can barely read or write.

8220;Where are the mountains in Iraq?8221; asks the teacher in a geography class for about 30 largely enthusiastic boys aged 11-13. One scrapes back his chair on the concrete floor.

Story continues below this ad

8220;North of Baghdad,8221; he chirps, plopping down pleased with himself in a line of pubescent boys proudly sporting downy fluff on their upper lips.

The number of overall security detainees in Iraq has skyrocketed in the six months since General David Petraeus flooded the nation with thousands more soldiers, to lift the total to 165,000 US troops, designed to quell the sectarian conflict and insurgency.

Some 16,000 detainees were in custody before this 8220;surge8221; in troop numbers. Today there are 24,000 detainees according to the US military. This year so far only 2251 detainees have been convicted.

Soldiers are now picking up more than 100 youngsters a month, up from an average of 25 a month last year.

Story continues below this ad

On February 1, there were 272 youth detainees. This week there were 787, said Captain John Flemming.

US commanders say most 8212; including some as young as 10 8212; are caught making and planting roadside bombs, or acting as lookouts for bombers and snipers. Others carry guns. Some are fighters.

Families are able to visit but for some it8217;s simply too dangerous to come to Baghdad. And despite it being against the law, 16 juveniles have been held more than a year.