- The Army investigation into photographs that purport
to show soldiers torturing an Iraqi prisoner is close to concluding that
the pictures were faked by soldiers trying to cash in on rumours of brutality.
-
- The Ministry of Defence said last night that the Royal
Military Police would seek this week to question Piers Morgan, the editor
of the Daily Mirror, which first published the photographs, and other senior
staff.
-
- Members of the Territorial Army who served with the Queen's
Lancashire Regiment in Iraq last year are also to be asked about the provenance
of the photographs.
-
- The 1st Battalion of the regiment was reinforced in Basra
by up to 100 members of the TA. The rifle and the lorry shown in the pictures
are used by the TA but not by regular units in Iraq. During the time the
regiment was in Iraq there were rumours of Iraqis being maltreated.
-
- The MoD has admitted that 10 RMP investigations are going
on into claims of brutality, nine involving the Army and one the RAF. None
of the alleged incidents is said to have occurred in the past seven months.
-
- Roger Goodwin, an Army spokesman, said: "There are
strong suspicions in the regiment and elsewhere that the pictures are false."
He refused to comment on the inquiry's investigation into serving members
of the regiment.
-
- Desmond Swayne, a senior Conservative MP who has spent
time with British troops in Basra, said that Mr Morgan must resign if the
photographs were proved to have been faked.
-
- The Mirror said: "Our sources are serving members
of the regiment and are standing by their account of what happened and
the veracity of the photographs."
-
- Nicholas Soames, the Conservative defence spokesman,
and Charles Kennedy, the leader of the Liberal Party, called for a defence
minister to make a statement to MPs about the Royal Military Police investigation.
-
- Mr Kennedy said that Mr Morgan must have thought "mightily
carefully" before publishing the pictures, knowing the inflammatory
effect they were bound to have internationally.
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