- Senior American politicians expressed outrage and disgust
after they were shown fresh photographs showing US soldiers abusing Iraqi
prisoners with forced sex and snarling dogs.
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- In separate private screenings on Capitol Hill, members
of Congress saw images and film of Iraqi corpses, military dogs menacing
cowering Iraqi prisoners, Iraqi women forced to expose themselves and other
sexual abuses.
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- Some lawmakers said the pictures included forced homosexual
sex; others said the quality of the photos were too poor to discern what
was happening.
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- The 1,600-plus photos, which included scenes of abuse
mixed in with travelogue-type snapshots, were in addition to the those
that already surfaced publicly depicting abuse and sexual humiliation at
Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad. The photos have created international condemnation
and threatened to undermine US military and rebuilding efforts in Iraq.
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- Lawmakers differed over whether the new batch of photos
should be released ? a decision likely will be left up to the US administration.
Some said they feared releasing photos would only further inflame international
passions; others argued it would demonstrate the openness of American society
and limit the damage caused by the gradual leaking of photos to media outlets.
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- They also disagreed about whether the photos they saw
were much worse than the ones already made public.
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- Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden said, "It was significantly
worse than anything that I had anticipated. Take the worst case and multiply
it several times over."
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- But Sen. Jim Talent, a Republican, said, "Anything
like this is shocking ... but it's generally the same as what's in the
public domain ? no huge surprises."
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- The private Capitol Hill screening marked the latest
turn in a scandal that has prompted George Bush to apologise to the victims
and Democrats to demand the dismissal of the Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
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- The Senate Armed Services Committee has been holding
hearings to determine whether prisoner abuses were limited to the Abu Ghraib
facility. The committee also wants to see whether responsibility went beyond
a small group of enlisted soldiers and their immediate supervisors, who
the Army says provided inadequate training and supervision.
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- Among the uncertainties is whether military intelligence
officials directly or indirectly encouraged the abuse in order to "soften
up" detainees for interrogations.
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- The Defence Department is investigating the abuse, and
the courts-martial of three military police guards have been ordered.
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- Lawmakers said the new photos showed small groups of
soldiers ? fewer than a dozen ? abusing the prisoners. Many of the soldiers'
faces were already familiar from photos published worldwide. It wasn't
clear whether all the abuse took place at Abu Ghraib or at other locations,
they said.
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- Senators said the photographs were presented as a rapid
slide show on a screen in the classified hearing room. Defense officials
were present, but did not answer questions about the pictures, apparently
fearing they might interfere with the any prosecutions.
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- The photos were seized from service members and included
many shots unrelated to the investigation, such as pictures of historic
sites. Some photos showed what appeared to be soldiers having sex. Because
of the vast number of photos, not all saw the same slides, and impressions
varied.
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- "I saw cruel, sadistic torture," said Democratic
Rep. Jane Harman, who added that some of the images were of male prisoners
masturbating. She said she saw a man hitting himself against a wall as
though to knock himself unconscious.
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- Sen. Ben Nelson, a Democrat, said he did not see acts
of violence, but what appeared to be "results of acts of violence."
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- He said he saw people in body bags and a person with
a face "virtually gone." He saw "people being stitched up
above the eyebrow apparently unconscious."
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- Democratic Rep. Gary Ackerman said, "There were
people who were forced to have sex with each other."
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- Republiacn Rep. Trent Franks said, "There were some
pictures where it looked like a prisoner was sodomizing himself" with
an object. He said blood was visible in the photograph.
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- But House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, a Republican, said
he thought "some people are overreacting".
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- "The people who are against the war are using this
to their political ends," he said.
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- http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=520751
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- Comment
From Ron Sperling
5-13-4
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- Jeff -
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- What kind of animals are these 'Republican' slime bags??
Some of their quotes should get them recalled by their constituents immediately.
This is astounding: "House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, a Republican,
said he thought "some people are overreacting" to the photos.
Right, Tom.
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- Our entire 'government' should all be dismissed and we
should institute some form of public service requirement and draft average
citizens to serve 2 year terms in the House. We could never do worse than
what we have there now. America is gone.
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