Web Extra | Military Commission cases

Over the years, the Pentagon has sworn out military commission charges against 26 detainees at Guantánamo. Here's how those cases stand after Attorney General Eric Holder's announcement that five 9/11 conspirators will be prosecuted in civilian court in New York.

The Guantánamo developments

Attorney General Eric Holder has announced a series of developments in the Obama administration's bid to shut down the prison camps at Guantánamo, chief among them plans for a 9/11 trial in New York City.

Web Extra | A prison camps primer

The Pentagon has built a series of prison camps at Guantánamo Bay since it inaugurated its offshore interrogation center for terrorist suspects in January 2002 by airlifting captives to remote Cuba from Bagram, Afghanistan. They include:

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Camp X-Ray: The first camp, with 320 cells made of chain-link fencing, has emerged as the iconic image of the rugged, makeshift accommodations granted so-called enemy combatants in remote Cuba. A maze of kennel-like cages, the camp housed prisoners for about four months. It was an arrangement that allowed them to chat and pray communally and at one point organize the first hunger strike. Now abandoned, and overgrown with weeds, it provides journalists from around the world an opportunity to see how the detention center's infrastructure has evolved. Opened: Jan. 11, 2002. Current population: zero.

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Camp Delta, also known as Camps 1-2-3: This was the first improvement for housing the detainees. Halliburton workers from the Indian subcontinent welded metal shipping containers to create about 720 individual steel and mesh cells in boxcar-style arrangements. Built in stages for well over $30 million, its first phase, built in May 2002 with a projected five-year life span, has been renovated to make it harder for captives to rip steel parts from the walls and floors of the cells. In June 2006, three Arab captives were simultaneously discovered hanging in their cells, initially unnoticed by guards because they hung towels to block the view. By January 2009, a Pentagon report said, it was being used to house an undisclosed number of hunger-striking detainees being force-fed nutritional shakes through tubes tethered up their noses and into their stomachs. Opened: April 28, 2002. Current detainee population: About 10.

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Camp Echo: This 24-cell camp has been used for captives to meet lawyers inside shed-style buildings containing a tiny cell, a toilet and shower, with adjoining space for a table and chairs, and an ankle shackle fixed to the floor. Until a federal judge ordered the practice halted in November 2004, it was used as a special segregation site for detainees facing war-crimes trials before Military Commissions. Confessed al Qaeda foot soldier David Hicks of Australia lived there on and off for long stretches of his five-year stay at Guantánamo and was segregated from the "enemy combatant" population following his guilty plea while awaiting repatriation to his homeland. A few detainees live there permanently for reasons the military has not explained. Opened: Date unknown. Current detainee population: Three to five.

Guidelines for inclusion in prison camp library

A list of guidelines for the Guantánamo detainee library, obtained by The Miami Herald, breaks down topics between restricted and authorized for distribution among war-on-terror captives.

SECOND IN A TWO-PART SERIES

Guantánamo base awaits uncertain future

These are days of uncertainty at Guantánamo Bay -- for the prisoners, contractors and sailors who will remain.

FIRST IN A TWO-PART SERIES

Townsfolk leery of holding terrorism suspects

The anxiety of locals who live near the brig at Charleston, S.C., one possible place Guantánamo detainees may be sent, is typical of opposition nationwide.

Harold's pal Kumar goes to the White House

The White House has hired Indian-American actor Kal Penn as a liaison between President Barack Obama's administration and arts groups.

Closing detainee camp a minefield of critical steps

To find a formula to close the Guantánamo prison camps, the incoming Obama administration will have to work through a thicket of questions.

'Platinum' captives held at off-limits Gitmo camp

The Pentagon has placed its newest camp strictly out of bounds for both media and military defense attorneys.

Photos echo 6 years later

In 2002, a Navy photographer captured the first Guantánamo detainees in shackles on their knees, creating an iconic image that still inspires protests.

IN THE PRISON CAMPS

Terror suspects' beards are safe now

In a practice that ended in May, guards at the prison camps cut Muslim captives' beards as a disciplinary measure. Captives said they saw it as an assault on Islam.

Captives rigged nooses

All four captives who killed themselves at the prison camps for suspected terrorists hanged themselves in their cells with craftily fashioned nooses, a senior officer said.

ISSUES and IDEAS

Guantánamo in pop culture

Fed by the Internet, the phenomenon has spread across the planet with blinding speed, transforming a place into an icon, perhaps like never before. Not Nuremberg. Not Pearl Harbor. Not the Watergate.

An Arts Sampler on Guantanamo

It's in books, films and poetry -- on the stage and in art installations

Detention chief used to tough tasks

The Pentagon's new policy advisor on detention has navigated the political and bureaucratic minefield between State and Defense departments.

IN THE PRISON CAMPS

Captive commits suicide in cell

Almost a year after three captives at Guantánamo Bay hanged themselves, a Saudi man was found dead in his cell. U.S. authorities said it was suicide.

ISSUES and IDEAS

Leaving Guantanamo

As first prison camps admiral departs the Pentagon's showcase detention and interrogation center, he tells The Miami Herald: "The detainees ought to have the opportunity to visit with lawyers."

IN THE PRISON CAMPS

Terror inmates endure solitary routine

With most detainees living in windowless, steel and cement cells, life at the prison camps at Guantánamo has turned into a lockdown routine.

Base readies for refugees

The Bush administration is preparing the U.S. Navy base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, to house up to 10,000 refugees in case of a Caribbean migrant crisis -- and starting with the bathrooms.