Pentagon hands over all Guantanamo names

updated 7:25 p.m. ET May 15, 2006

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - The Pentagon gave The Associated Press on Monday the first list of everyone who has been held at Guantanamo Bay, more than four years after it opened the detention center in Cuba.

None of the most notorious terrorist suspects was included on the list, however, raising questions about where America's most dangerous prisoners are being held.

A total 201 names of prisoners had never been disclosed by the Defense Department before. Officials say 759 detainees have been held at the detention center.

The handover marks the first time that everyone who has been held by the Defense Department at Guantanamo Bay in the Bush administration's war on terror has been identified, according to Navy Lt. Cmdr. Chito Peppler.

Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said the names of all detainees held at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base were previously kept classified because of "the security operation as well as the intelligence operation that takes place down there."

In a briefing in Washington, he did not explain why — if there was such a security risk — the Pentagon did not contest the AP's request for the release of the names, as it did with previous Freedom of Information Act requests for prisoner information. Just last month, the Pentagon released 558 names of current and former detainees to AP.

‘One step closer’
David Tomlin, the AP's assistant general counsel, said the list "takes us one step closer" to the goal of finding out all the details about those in U.S. military custody in Guantanamo.

The release will help lawyers and other advocates track who has been held at the base and find former detainees to help investigate allegations of abuse, said Priti Patel, an attorney for New York-based Human Rights First.

While the release of Guantanamo names is welcome, human rights groups also want to learn the identities of all those held in Iraq, Afghanistan and secret locations, Patel said.

"There's still much more in darkness," she said.

For example, the United States has not disclosed where it is holding Khalid Shaikh Mohammed or Ramzi Binalshibh, who allegedly plotted the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and other captured top al-Qaida figures. The list released Monday also does not specify what has happened to former Guantanamo Bay detainees.

The fate of some is documented. All British nationals held at Guantanamo Bay, for example, were transferred back to Britain. But what has become of dozens of other detainees was not known.

Some could be free. Others could be in secret U.S. detention centers, or in torture cells of prisons in other countries.

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