- WASHINGTON -- An official
report on the Abu Ghraib abuse scandal yesterday blamed a failure of leadership
at the Pentagon for negligence over prison conditions and confusion over
interrogation rules which led to "Animal House" sadism in the
Iraqi jail. The report, by a four-member panel of Pentagon advisers, did
not pin direct responsibility on the defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld,
by name, nor did it find any top officials legally culpable. The worst
abuse at Abu Ghraib, it said, was carried out by night shift guards.
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- But the report represented an implicit indictment of
the defence secretary's management of the defence department.
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- "We believe there is institutional and personal
responsibility right up the chain of command as far as Washington is concerned,"
James Schlesinger, a former defence secretary who chaired the panel, told
reporters yesterday.
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- Mr Rumsfeld issued a non-committal response last night.
"The panel has provided important information and recommendations
that will be of assistance in our ongoing efforts to improve detention
operations," he said in a statement.
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- "The defence department has an obligation to evaluate
what happened and to make appropriate changes. The independent panel's
contributions will be of great help to us."
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- For the first time since the Abu Ghraib scandal broke
in March, the Schlesinger report officially made a connection between the
actions or omissions of the Bush administration and the brutal treatment
of prisoners in US military prisons, and could deepen the damage already
done by the affair to the president's re-election effort.
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- "I think this is going to be more of a problem than
they anticipated when they appointed this panel," said Professor Scott
Silliman, an expert on military law at Duke University in North Carolina.
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- The Schlesinger report depicts the torture scandal as
one of the unseen circumstances of poor planning by the Pentagon leadership.
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- "In Iraq, there was not only a failure to plan for
a major insurgency, but also to adapt to the insurgency that followed after
major combat operations," the report found, adding that the war plan
assumed a period of "relatively benign stability" would precede
a transfer of power to the new Iraqi authorities.
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- More damning details of the use of torture against Iraqi
prisoners are expected to surface today, with the results of a separate
army investigation into the role of military intelligence at Abu Ghraib.
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- Leaks from that report, published in the Washington Post
yesterday, included a finding that some guards used dogs to terrify prisoners
as young as 15, in a sadistic game aimed at making their victims wet themselves
in fear. The report will also mention evidence that at least one Iraqi
male detainee was raped.
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- Mr Schlesinger said yesterday that "chaos"
reigned at Abu Ghraib.He said there was "sadism on the nightshift"
and added, "It was a kind of Animal House on the night shift ,"
in a reference to the 1978 film which portrays the unsavoury antics of
a bunch of hedonistic students.
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- "There is no evidence of a policy of abuse promulgated
by senior officials or military authorities," the Schlesinger report
found. But Mr Schlesinger said yesterday: "There was indirect responsibility
at higher levels, in that the weaknesses at Abu Ghraib were well known
and corrective action could have been taken, and should have been taken."
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- The Schlesinger report said "confusing and inconsistent
interrogation technique policies" issued by the Pentagon and the White
House contributed to the belief among officers and soldiers at Abu Ghraib
that they could use methods that had been allowed at Guant·namo
Bay, but banned for use in Iraq.
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- The panel also found fault with America's top generals
in the joint chiefs of staff, for failing to make sufficient manpower and
resources available at Abu Ghraib prison and the rest of a huge network
of military jails that has sprung up around the world.
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- The former US force commander in Iraq, Lieutenant General
Ricardo Sanchez, was blamed in the report. But he, too, escaped legal responsibility,
and the panel did not recommend a reprimand.
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- Until today, only seven military police guards have been
charged for the abuse of prisoners in Abu Ghraib, and human rights groups
said the Schlesinger report was a whitewash of the Bush administration's
responsibility.
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- Administration critics say US leaders created the conditions
for the abuse by insisting suspected terrorists did not merit treatment
under Geneva convention rules.
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- Today's army report into the role of military intelligence,
by Major General George Fay, is expected to recommend proceedings against
soldiers who are not already among the seven facing trial, and against
civilian contractors who worked at Abu Ghraib.
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- Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited
2004
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- http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1290303,00.html
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