Iraqis Tortured Detainees, PM Says
Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari confirmed Tuesday that more than 173 Interior Ministry prisoners were found malnourished and possibly tortured by the new government's security forces.
Al-Jaafari's comments came a day after an Interior Ministry official said an investigation will be opened into allegations that its officers tortured suspects detained in connection with Iraq's insurgency.
"I was informed that there were 173 detainees held at an Interior Ministry prison and they appear to be malnourished. There is also some talk that they were subjected to some kind of torture," al-Jaafari said at a news conference.
Maj. Gen. Hussein Kamal, the Interior Ministry's undersecretary for security, said the detention center was in Baghdad.
Late Sunday, U.S. troops surrounded and took control of an Interior Ministry building in Baghdad, apparently in connection with repeated allegations that Iraq security forces were illegally detaining and torturing people suspected of taking part in the insurgency.
Meanwhile, U.S. and Iraqi forces fighting insurgents near the Syrian border ran into fierce resistance Tuesday, with troops encountering dozens of explosive booby traps and killing dozens of insurgents.
The U.S. command said three U.S. Marines have died in combat while trying to clear the town of Obeidi as part of "Operation Steel Curtain" since Monday. At least 80 insurgents have been killed in the same period, mostly in airstrikes, the statement said.
In other developments:
The U.S.-Iraqi attack on Obeidi was the latest stage of an offensive to clear al Qaeda-led insurgents from a string of towns and cities in the Euphrates River valley near the border with Syria and seal off a major route for foreign fighters sneaking into Iraq.
Earlier this month, U.S. and Iraqi forces overran two other towns in the area, Husaybah and Karabilah. Unlike previous sweeps in the area, the Americans and their Iraqi allies plan to establish a long-term presence to keep insurgents from returning.
U.S. officials have said the Euphrates Valley campaign is also aimed at encouraging Sunni Arabs there to vote in the Dec. 15 parliamentary elections without fear of insurgent reprisals. The Bush administration hopes a successful election with strong Sunni Arab participation will encourage many in that community to abandon the insurgency.
One Marine died Tuesday from wounds incurred from a bomb that exploded day before, the military said. The other two Marines were killed Monday — one by a roadside bomb in Obeidi, and the other by small arms fire, it said. All were assigned to Regimental Combat Team 2, 2nd Marine Division.
The deaths brought to 2,071 the number of U.S. service members who have been killed since the war started in 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
The torture allegations come as the United Nations "entered the highly-charged international debate on rights of battlefield combatants with a harshly critical report of detention, human rights abuses and a breakdown of law and order," CBS News Foreign Affairs Analyst Pamela Falkreports.
The five-page report, from the U.N. Assistance Mission in Iraq, said military operations by U.S.-led multinational forces and the Iraqi army had "a negative impact on human rights" and cited figures that more than 10,000 families have been displaced in two restive provinces Anbar and Nineveh alone.
It said there were 23,394 detainees in Iraq, with 11,559 of them held by multinational forces.
Citing "open sources," the report also said that random killings and terrorist actions had killed or wounded 26,000 people since 2004, with over 30,000 civilians killed in Iraq since March 2003 when U.S.-led forces invaded Iraq. The report did not break down the numbers or specify the sources.
Major Sunni Arab politicians and religious leaders complained Monday that military activities like Operation Steel Curtain will discourage voter turnout in predominantly Sunni areas. Iraq's Sunni vice president also has called for halting such operations, especially in western Iraq and in a province around the city of Baqouba.
"These military operations have gone too far and have a negative impact on the country's politics," Vice President Ghazi al-Yawer told Al-Arabiya television.
Hundreds of Sunni Arabs marched Monday through the streets of Baqouba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad, to protest Iraqi security raids in the surrounding province over the weekend. More than 300 people, mostly Sunni Arabs, were arrested, officials said.
Members of the crowd carried banners denouncing the arrests of Sunni Arabs and chanted, "No to America, no to Britain!"
Most Sunni Arabs boycotted the Jan. 30 elections, enabling the majority Shiites and their Kurdish allies to dominate the current parliament. Many Sunni politicians now consider the boycott a mistake and have urged fellow Sunnis to vote next month, although hard-liners in the insurgency and among the Sunni clergy remain opposed.
With casualties rising and elections just a month away, U.S. and other countries have stepped up diplomatic efforts to try to reconcile Iraq's disparate factions. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and former Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov have all visit Baghdad in the past five days to encourage successful elections.