British troops face new abuse claims

Friday May 7, 01:12 AM

British troops face new abuse claims
By Astrid Zweynert

LONDON (Reuters) - The Ministry of Defence says it is investigating fresh charges of mistreatment of prisoners in Iraq after the Daily Mirror on Friday published the testimony of a British soldier who said he had witnessed severe beatings.

The Mirror said the man had given military police full details of the attacks, including names and ranks of the soldiers involved in the beatings.

The soldier, a trooper with the same regiment already at the centre of an investigation into abuse of Iraqi prisoners, said the violence was led by three ringleaders.

"I witnessed four beatings when people where punched and kicked," the soldier told the Mirror. "They'd be on their knees, and when they dropped their hands they'd be kicked until they raised them again."

....

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/040507/325/eszwg.html

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At least for witness. There's going to be a lot more.

And, Welcome to DU.

:toast:

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'New witness' in Iraq abuse claim

How the Daily Mirror is treating the story's latest twist
The Daily Mirror's editor says a new witness has come forward to claim some UK troops abused Iraqi prisoners.
Piers Morgan says a soldier from the Queen's Lancashire Regiment has a dossier including claims of "appalling beatings" by a small "rogue element".

The Ministry of Defence has confirmed to the BBC that the man has approached military police to discuss the claims.

...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/3691857.stm

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=518959

A member of the Territorial Army has made a series of allegations to military police that Iraqi prisoners were beaten and abused by British soldiers.

The TA soldier claims in today's Daily Mirror, that he saw Iraqi prisoners of war being beaten on four separate occasions. The new accusations concern the Queen's Lancashire Regiment, which is already being investigated over photographs of alleged torture published in the newspaper.

The TA man, referred to as "Soldier C", says PoWs were punched and kicked. In one assault, he says, a corporal placed a sandbag over a suspect's face and poked his fingers into the man's eyes until he screamed with pain.

Piers Morgan, the editor of the Daily Mirror, said Soldier C, had handed a dossier of evidence detailing "appalling beatings" to the Royal Military Police. "He will be naming the names of the people responsible, including corporals and sergeants and some senior officers who he says were culpable in tacitly allowing this to happen," Mr Morgan said.

Since bush made such a big deal about the Saddam rape rooms. It was safe to assume that he was doing it too.

... said that this might be referring to the known case of an Iraqi
POW beaten to death last July - seven people arrested and coming to
trial - but they are still investigating.

Funny how Piers Morgan gets the low-down on stuff like this.

Even funnier how Piers Morgan now states that this is more important
than whether or not the recently released photos are valid or fakes.

Hmmm.

--snip
...
THREE rogue soldiers got away with spearheading a sickening campaign of abuse against Iraqi PoWs, a British trooper claimed yesterday.

Soldier C told the Mirror that suspects had "10 kids of crap" beaten out of them and said officers only stepped in when the appalling beatings got too heavy.

Believing it his duty to expose the shameful acts he has witnessed and see the guilty punished, he told the Mirror: "It was a few bad NCOs who encouraged it - and the others just followed their lead.

"In battle situations when you capture someone, you're supposed to keep up the shock of capture so you can extract more things out of prisoners, like important information.
...
--snap
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnews/tm_objectid=14217558%26method=full%26siteid=50143%26headline=third%2dbrit%2dsoldier%2dtells%2dus%2d%2di%2dsaw%2dpow%2dbeatings-name_page.html