Warnings of abuse in Iraq's prisons that were ignored

[G_j]

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,1207957,00.html

Warnings of abuse in Iraq's prisons that were ignored

Photographs of American and British troops humiliating prisoners could change the public mood across the world. But the coalition has brushed aside similar complaints for six months

Peter Beaumont and Kahal Ahmed in London, Edward Helmore in New York and Jason Burke in Baghdad

Sunday May 2, 2004
The Observer

The vast British base at the international airport on the outskirts of Basra is a curiously quiet place. In the arrivals hall - with its little coffee bar - the desert boots of British soldiers squeak across the floor. Go up to the first floor and the officers will tell, with a slightly patronising air, how the British Army is doing things differently here in the south. They will tell you about their unique experience, about lessons learnt in Northern Ireland, compared with the ill-trained US forces in the north.

By yesterday those reassurances sounded increasingly hollow as pictures of British soldiers - allegedly members of the Queen's Lancashire Regiment - were published yesterday apparently showing them beating an Iraqi detainee and urinating on him during an eight-hour long assault last year. It was the second set of photographs to emerge in two days, after US soldiers in the north were shown abusing detainees

Suddenly the two major Allies have been tarred with the same awful brush - charged with beating and abusing Iraqis in their care. After weeks of bad news from Iraq the pictures have threatened to explode the fragile and contentious legitimacy of UK operations in Iraq.

In the images published in the Mirror newspaper yesterday, a hooded Iraqi, allegedly a thief, is sitting in the back of what looks like a canvas-sided vehicle, stripped to his underpants and a T-shirt with an Iraqi flag on it. In one photograph a soldier urinates on his head. In another a kick is aimed at his head, while in a third an assault rifle is jabbed at his genitals.
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[peace4all]

1. six months!

that is disgusting!