Iraqi court rulings stop at US detention sites

"The U.S. army's refusal to release my husband shows that the Americans do not care about how Iraqis suffer," Sundis Nimaa, Humadi's 34-year-old wife said between sobs.

"They have brought my family down and they have separated the children from their father," she told The Associated Press. "They think they can do whatever they like because they have the upper hand in this country."

Humadi's lawyer, al-Baghdadi, accuses Washington of rejecting the very legal system it helped forge.

"The trial was fair and the judge followed the right legal procedure and even the appeal court approved the ruling," al-Baghdadi said.

The U.S. military does not comment on individual cases.

It insists, however, that the detention system is authorized by a U.N. resolution under which the Iraqi government allows U.S. troops to detain people at will. U.S. military attorneys also say it complies with international laws covering warfare and was created in "the spirit" of the Geneva Conventions.

These laws, the military says, are designed to take fighters off the streets, not determine guilt or innocence.

"There are a large number that, after being acquitted, are released," said Maj. Gen. Doug Stone, commander of detainee operations in Iraq. "In some cases, and we are talking about a very small number, the compelling information that we have mandates that they still stay in our detention."

But rights groups have criticized U.S. detention policy as a misrepresentation of international law, which they say requires some form of legal process to detain someone.

"There are basic issues of access to judicial review and access to due process rights that are not being met," said Joseph Logan, a researcher who specializes on Iraq for Human Rights Watch.