United States detain nearly 800 juveniles in Iraq

US Holding Nearly 800 Children in Iraq for 'Planting Bombs'

BAGHDAD: US troops are holding nearly 800 children and teenagers on a Baghdad base, boys who are largely illiterate and picked up for allegedly planting bombs and now the focus of a multi-million-dollar education project.Dressed in orange jumpsuits reminiscent of the uniforms of terror suspects held at Guantanamo Bay, the youngsters aged 10 to 17 attend a US-run school seven days a week, eight hours a day, in order to mend their ways.Equipped with four football pitches, 18 classrooms and a library, the school is stocked with television sets, DVDs, Harry Potter in Arabic, text books, white boards, rows of desks and chairs, and hot lunches.Running around barefoot on the stony sports field, trousers rolled to their knees and kicking a ball around, they shriek with delight as American soldiers stand watch from a guard tower next to giant blast walls. Inside, soldiers stand with pepper spray ready, sunglasses clamped round their heads, keeping watch as civilian Iraqi teachers try to instil basic grammar and arithmetic into teenagers who can barely read or write.