- WASHINGTON (AFP) -- A member
of US military intelligence said that the army tried to cover up the extent
of detainee abuse in Iraq, a US television network reported.
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- Sergeant Samuel Provance told ABC television that dozens
of soldiers had been involved in the abuse at Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad.
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- Seven soldiers have been charged. The first will face
a court-martial Wednesday in the Iraqi capital.
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- "There's definitely a cover-up," Provance said
in an interview with the World News Tonight programme released in advance
of the broadcast. "People are either telling themselves or being told
to be quiet."
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- Provance, 30, was part of the 302nd Military Intelligence
Battalion stationed at Abu Ghraib last September.
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- ABC said the soldier, who is now in Germany, gave the
interview despite orders from his commanders not to.
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- "What I was surprised at was the silence,"
Provance was quoted as saying. "The collective silence by so many
people that had to be involved, that had to have seen something or heard
something."
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- Provance ran the military intelligence computer network
at the prison.
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- He said he did not see the abuse that has brought international
criticism on the US military but that interrogators admitted they directed
the military police to be rough with prisoners.
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- "Anything (the MPs) were to do legally or otherwise,
they were to take those commands from the interrogators," Provance
said.
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- The seven charged so far, who include three women, are
all from a military police company.
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- Some have said they acted under orders but military officials
have said the abuse seen in photos of naked prisoners at Abu Ghraib was
limited to a few MPs.
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- Provance said the sexual humiliation began as a technique
ordered by military intelligence.
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- "One interrogator told me about how commonly the
detainees were stripped naked, and in some occasions, wearing women's underwear,"
Provance said.
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- "If it's your job to strip people naked, yell at
them, scream at them, humiliate them, it's not going to be too hard to
move from that to another level."
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- Provance told how US soldiers struck prisoners around
the neck and inmates were knocked out.
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- "Then (the soldier) would go to the next detainee,
who would be very fearful and voicing their fear, and the MP would calm
him down and say: 'We're not going to do that. It's okay. Everything's
fine,' and then do the exact same thing to him."
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- Provance also described how two drunken interrogators
took a female Iraqi prisoner from her cell in the middle of the night and
stripped her to the waist. The men were restrained by another MP.
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- The role of US military intelligence in the abuse is
being investigated by Major General George Fay, the army's deputy chief
of staff for intelligence.
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- Provance said that when Fay interviewed him, he seemed
interested only in the military police, not the interrogators, and seemed
to discourage him from testifying.
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- Provance said Fay threatened to take action against him
for failing to report what he saw sooner.
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- "I feel like I'm being punished for being honest,"
Provance said.
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- "You know, it was almost as if I actually felt if
all my statements were shredded and I said, like most everybody else, 'I
didn't hear anything, I didn't see anything. I don't know what you're talking
about,' then my life would be just fine right now."
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- Copyright © 2004 Agence France Presse. All rights
reserved. The information contained in the AFP News report may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority
of Agence France Presse.
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- http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1521&e=4&
u=/afp/20040518/pl_afp/us_iraq_prisoners_040518231124
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