Foreign prisoners held at the U.S. naval base in Guantanamo, Cuba, do not see any hope that they could leave U.S. custody in their lifetime, according to newly-released transcripts of hearings at the island prison.

"We are in a grave here," a prisoner named Ahamed Abdul Aziz was quoted as saying in one of the transcripts publicized last Friday by the Pentagon under a court order.

Aziz has been held in Guantanamo for more than three years and has been interrogated 50 times, but has never been charged with a crime.

His words echoed the overwhelming despair felt by many of the 490 or so prisoners at Guantanamo, about 98 percent of them have never been charged with a crime.

"I don't want to spend any more time here. Not one more minute, " Mohammed Gul, an Afghan prisoner, said at a hearing.

Another Afghan prisoner said, "I was not a Taliban. I was not against the Americans. I want to go home."

Meanwhile, there are signs that the U.S. government plans to make Guantanamo a permanent detention facility.

A two-storey prison building which can house 200 detainees is scheduled to open this summer. It will be located near a similar facility that can house 100 detainees.

The Guantanamo prison has altogether held some 750 detainees at different times since 2002, most of whom were captured in the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan in 2001, being held indefinitely without a trial.

Source: Xinhua