In findings on U.S. observance of the U.N.'s main political rights' convention, the committee said it had "credible and uncontested" information that the United States had detained people "secretly and in secret places for months and years."

"The state party should immediately abolish all secret detention and secret detention facilities," it said, echoing a similar demand in May by the United Nations' Committee on Torture.

The committee said it could not accept Washington's argument that the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which the United States has signed, does not apply to anyone held outside U.S. territory."