WASHINGTON, April 8 (Xinhuanet) -- Officials at the US Defense Department are drafting a doctrine for wartime prison operations that would detail a strict chain of command and clearer detention rules, The Washington Post reported Friday.

    The draft, to draw lessons learned from detainee abuses in Iraqand Afghanistan, recognizes that commanders in Iraq did not plan for what became extensive detention operations and intelligence gathering, with tens of thousands of detainees landing in US custody, the report said.

    Defense officials were quoted as saying that they were dedicated to putting lessons learned from detainee abuses into newpolicy, and the draft appears to focus on the problems that emerged at the Abu Ghraib prison outside Baghdad: lack of clear command structure, murky rules for soldiers, a lax and sometimes ignored registration program for detainees, and soldiers who were unaware of, or unconcerned with, the Geneva Conventions protectingdetainees.

    The new policy would seek to have commanders designate a chief of detainee operations who would be solely responsible for all aspects of US detention facilities in a particular wartime theater,the report said.

    The draft, however, would allow some detainees to be classifiedas "enemy combatants," rather than as prisoners of war, creating adesignation not recognized in the Geneva Conventions.

    Human Rights Watch, an independent group that has been monitoring detainee abuse, has sharply criticized the draft policy,saying that the provision on enemy combatants gives military officials a way to circumvent international law.

    The draft could cause more "ghost detainees" to disappear within the military detention system, as some enemy combatants might not receive serial numbers if they are not considered official prisoners of war, the organization said.

    "Instead of correcting current violations of the Geneva Conventions, these guidelines would shred the conventions further," Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch, was quoted as saying. Enditem