Former Iraqi Rights Minister Says Abuses Continue

In an interview with French weekly Le Journal de Dimanche released ahead of publication Sunday, Turki said he had warned U.S. administrator Paul Bremer of the abuse in November.

The scandal over detainee abuse broke last week with the release of photographs showing the sexual humiliation of Iraqi prisoners in Abu Ghraib, a U.S.-run jail outside Baghdad.

"The first reports I received concerned the city of Umm Qasr, the detention zone at Baghdad airport, and finally the prison at Abu Ghraib. But there was torture at all the American bases," he told the newspaper.

"I have information about further abuses committed against prisoners just this week," he said, but did not elaborate.

Turki, who resigned one month ago over U.S. military action in the flashpoint town of Falluja, said he had quickly understood that Bremer "did not have the power to ask the military to change its methods."

"If he had had more power over them, I believe things would not have got out of hand like this," he said.

"We were waiting impatiently for the end of the old regime, convinced that we would never see these sorts of scenes in Iraq again. But the Coalition does not value the Iraqis at all," Turki said. "These dealings prove that America has failed to defend democracy in Iraq," he added.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=5080815

Iraqi Leaders Call For Amnesty Amid Abuse Scandal
8 May 2004 -- Local leaders from western Iraq today called on the U.S. civil administrator, L. Paul Bremer, to release all
detainees as a goodwill gesture, following revelations that U.S. troops abused Iraqi prisoners.


Officials from the Sunni-majority Al-Anbad Province met with Bremer today at U.S. headquarters in Baghdad. They said many families of prisoners fear their loved ones are suffering similar abuse.

The leaders made the request a day after U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld took responsibility and apologized for the abuse, and offered compensation to the victims:

"I am seeking a way to provide appropriate compensation to those detainees who suffered such grievous and brutal abuse and cruelty at the hands of a few members of the United States armed forces. It is the right thing to do," Rumsfeld said.

Bremer today called the abuses "outrageous" and said he hopes to carry out Rumsfeld's offer of compensation.

Bremer did not offer to fulfill the local leaders' request for an amnesty, however. He said 75 percent of the 43,000 people rounded up by U.S. troops since the invasion have already been freed.

Meanwhile, the U.S. military has charged a female soldier with abusing Iraqi prisoners, making her the seventh to face charges.

http://www.rferl.org/featuresarticle/2004/05/8e37fabb-0037-4c44-815b-9210649dfec0.html