US admits imprisoning adolescents in Iraq

The US army admits for the first time to having detained adolescents in its prisons in Iraq, according to a German press report.

The TV magazine "Report Mainz," to be broadcast Monday evening on the ARD network, quoted Lieutenant Colonel Barry Johnson, a spokesman for the US troops in Iraq, as saying that they still imprisoned 58 Iraqis in the age of from 14 and 17.

The Iraqi adolescents are held in the prisons of Abu Ghraib and "Camp Bucca" and the length of their average imprisonment is half a year, Johnson said.

Johnson denied that those adolescents were tortured and promised that US authorities would look into accusation of mishandling if it arose....

The TV broadcast's from Germany. The story is from China's Xinhuanet. I know it's silly, but could someone in America please break a sweat and confirm or deny this?

(If you missed it, last week Sadly, No! published an e-mail from a National Guardsman who was at Camp Bucca and thought there were 60 or so minors there. He knew of no mistreatment at Bucca but thought mistreatment at Abu Ghraib was a distinct possibility.)