The British government has admitted to holding up to 85 people without charge in Afghanistan. The prisoners have been jailed at Camp Bastion for as long as 14 months, with no charges or indication of a pending trial. Phil Shiner of Britain’s Public Interest Lawyers denounced their imprisonment.

Phil Shiner: “People are being detained indefinitely, incommunicado. No one knows that they are — where they are, until today. Their relatives have not been able to see them. They’ve had intermittent contact with them over the Internet. They’ve had no access to lawyers. They have not been charged. They’re not going to be brought before a court. And our common law system has long recognized that that is completely unlawful.”

A British court will convene a hearing on the prisoners’ fate in July.