Associated Press Army Military Police escort a detainee to his cell in Camp X-Ray at the naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba Jan. 11. The detainee was escorted during in-processing to the temporary detention facility.

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba - The treatment of detained terrorist suspects from the Afghanistan war is getting more scrutiny from the international community.

A federal judge in Los Angeles, meanwhile, delayed ruling on a petition that alleges the prisoners are being held in violation of the Geneva Conventions and U.S. Constitution.

U.S. District Judge A. Howard Matz said he had "grave doubts" about his jurisdiction and gave federal prosecutors until Jan. 31 to file papers calling for dismissal of the petition on jurisdictional grounds. The judge said he will hold another hearing Feb. 14. Federal attorneys said they would file for dismissal of the case.

The court challenge of the detention of al-Qaida suspects at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base demanded that the U.S. government bring the suspects before a court and define the charges against them. A coalition that includes former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark and other prominent civil rights advocates brought the suit.

Yesterday, the European Union and Germany joined a chorus of protests from the Netherlands, British legislators, Amnesty International and the International Committee of the Red Cross demanding that the detainees be given prisoner-of-war status subject to the Geneva Conventions.

Sweden called Monday for fair treatment for a Swedish captive. Denmark said one of its citizens was also among the prisoners detained by the United States - though it did not specify whether he was being held in Afghanistan or Cuba - and said all prisoners should be treated with respect.

EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana told Spanish National Television that "the detention of people like this should be as laid down by international conventions."

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said yesterday the United States is treating the prisoners at Guantanamo Bay "humanely," and in accordance with Geneva Conventions.

"No detainee has been harmed. No detainee has been mistreated in any way," the defense secretary said in Washington.

The detainees are receiving "warm showers, toiletries, water, clean clothes, blankets, regular, culturally appropriate meals, prayer mats and the right to practice their religions," in addition to medical care, writing materials and visits from the International Red Cross, Rumsfeld said.

Rumsfeld said critics were not taking into account the danger detainees pose to military guards. He said that one detainee at Guantanamo has threatened to kill Americans, and another has bitten a U.S. military guard.

The West risks losing support in the fight against terrorism if it mistreats the prisoners or subjects them to the death penalty, said EU External Relations Commissioner Chris Patten.

"That would be a way of losing international support and losing the moral high ground," Patten said. He urged a show of "decency and generosity of spirit to the vanquished, even if they are pretty dangerous."

Rumsfeld said the United States has not decided if the detainees should be treated as prisoners of war, and for now calls them battlefield detainees. He said the Geneva Conventions call for so-called "unlawful combatants" to be treated humanely, and the United States military is treating them humanely.

Under the Geneva Conventions, POWs would have to be tried by the same courts and procedures as American soldiers, not by military tribunals.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said yesterday that the U.S. military has implemented some recommendations from its team in Guatanamo. But Urs Boegli, the agency's senior representative from Washington, D.C., declined to say what those were.

"I'm confident through this work we can make a difference," he told reporters.

Boegli said his team had interviewed 20 detainees on a one-to-one basis "in a calm, serene situation." They gave them cigarettes to smoke and the inmates gave them written messages to send home, he said.

"I'm satisfied with the access, with the cooperation from authorities down to the guards in the camp," he said.

Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair tried to defuse London press accusations of torture at the base, saying through a spokesman Monday that three Britons among the detainees say they have no complaints about their treatment.

The number of detainees at the base in remote Cuba rose to 158 with Monday's arrival of 14 battle-scarred fighters on stretchers, including two amputees and three with infections requiring surgery.

The military C-141 cargo plane bringing them here was the sixth flight bringing detainees from the U.S. base at Kandahar in Afghanistan, where 218 detainees remain. The 14 prisoners were carried from the aircraft on stretchers by Marines in yellow rubber gloves and turquoise surgical masks.

The Marines seemed to frisk the captives before carrying them to a bus. The detainees wore blacked-out goggles and orange jumpsuits, and appeared to have their arms strapped to their bodies.

"They were restrained in a manner appropriate, in a way that would not aggravate their medical conditions," Coast Guard Lt. Cmdr. Brendan McPherson said.

Similar photographs of detainees kneeling on rocky earth, published by the U.S. Department of Defense on Friday, have provoked protests in Britain.

U.S. military officials say the precautions are taken during the flight and are removed once prisoners are processed and led to their cell.

The Red Cross, which has a team at Guantanamo, said Monday it considers the detainees prisoners of war, and the photographs violate a Geneva Convention protecting them from "public curiosity."

"Such pictures should not be disseminated. They could have a strong impact on the family and the Muslim community worldwide," spokesman Darcy Christen said in Geneva.

Recognizing the detainees as prisoners of war would mean trying them under the same procedures as U.S. soldiers - by court-martial or civilian courts, not military tribunals.

Monday night, Marine Brig. Gen. Mike Lehnert, who is in charge of the detention mission, defended the temporary cells where detainees are being held - a concrete slab divided by chain-link fences and topped by a corrugated metal roof that some human rights advocates have likened to kennels and cages.

"We have to look at Camp X-ray as a work in progress, a temporary facility that 20 days ago didn't exist," Lehnert told CNN.

All but two of the 160 cells were occupied Monday, but officials said another 60 would be built in three days and they could put two captives in one cell.

Lehnert said plans are to build a more permanent prison "exactly in accordance with federal prison standards" which "will be much more comfortable."

At the camp, a new green-and-white sign in Arabic points in the direction of Mecca, which Muslims face to pray.

Lehnert said a Muslim cleric from the U.S. Navy was to arrive yesterday to discuss religious issues, including whether detainees are allowed to grow hair and beards that were shaved off.

Prison guards said leaders are emerging among the detainees. The Miami Herald said one tried to use a prayer period to rally prisoners, chanting "Be strong. Allah will save us."

The Herald reported that the most prominent inmate appears to be former Taliban army chief of staff Mullah Fazel Mazloom, though U.S. commanders refuse to identify inmates.