A newly-freed Afghan prisoner, wearing traditional salwar khameez attire, leaves during a ceremony handing over the Bagram prison to Afghan authorities, at the US airbase in Bagram north of Kabul on September 10, 2012. The US on September 10 formally handed control to Afghanistan of more than 3,000 detainees at a controversial prison dubbed the country's 'Guantanamo Bay', but disagreements remain over the fate of hundreds of inmates. Kabul has hailed the transfer of Bagram prison as a victory fo
KABUL, Afghanistan -- U.S. officials
have handed over formal control of a prison housing thousands of Taliban
and terror suspects to the Afghan government, even as disagreements
between Washington and Kabul over their detention mar the transfer.
President
Hamid Karzai has hailed the transfer of Bagram prison, Afghanistan's
only large-scale U.S.-run detention facility, as a victory for Afghan
sovereignty.
The handover ceremony took place Monday at the prison next to a sprawling U.S. airfield in Bagram, north of Kabul.
The
U.S. already gave Afghanistan authority over most of the 3,000
detainees at the base before March 9, when the countries signed a
handover agreement.
The U.S. recently
suspended the transfer of new detainees apparently because of
disagreements with Kabul, which has questioned the long-term detention
of suspects without charge after their capture.
Associated Press