The LAT reports that Iraqi (primarily Sunni) men are being held in prisons for considerable time periods (in years) without having access to counsel. This is upsetting, and counterproductive for purposes of national reconciliation/progress/peace. The US government is currently sponsoring a legal aid clinic to help secure representation for these men, but as negotiations for the Status of Forces Agreement drag on, it appears that the clinic's days are numbered.

As the Bush administration touts security gains, the issue of the detainees raises questions about the Iraqi government's commitment to human rights, and undermines Sunni trust in the Shiite-led government — a disenchantment that could even send some Iraqis into the arms of the waning insurgency.

“Unsurprisingly, someone who's been deprived of their liberties for months and years without even a hint of due process . . . of course they’re going to be angry,” said Joseph Logan of Human Rights Watch, who recently spent time in the country researching the Iraqi justice system. “As the Americans found in 2003, the enemies you create are going to be there down the road. I think there is definitely political impact down the road from this.”

While these actions certainly do call the Iraqi government's commitment to human rights into question, some context might be helpful. Saddam Hussein did not exactly leave a strong infrastructure for due process; as the article says:

In a country where detainee files are nothing more than pages held together with straight pins and string, there is no computer database to check for an inmate's records. It can take months to get responses, during which time the detainee ordered freed sits in prison.

Of course, this should be better. No one deserves to sit in jail unfairly accused, and the government of Iraq and the United States envoys need to be mindful of which projects will go the furthest in creating a stable environment. But the up-close perspective of news reporting sometimes obscures the fact that Iraq's problems do not make up a list so much as they form a web. Might the fact that the Parliament cannot decide on a workable election law indicate that it isn't only the detained Sunnis accused of being terrorists that are dissatisfied with the legal system? Might we take the chronic problems with electricity provision to mean that electronic record-keeping is a long way in the future in every industry? Viewing everything through the lens of sectarianism will not necessarily lead to the clearest understanding of the issues at hand.