A leaked report shows that Red Cross officials had complained about regular abuses in Iraq that seemed "tolerated" months before a U.S. soldier raised concerns about the mistreatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison.
According to the report, excerpts of which were published Monday by the Wall Street Journal, field investigators for the Red Cross found repeated instances of degrading treatment. They warned that interrogators were violating both the Third and Fourth Geneva Conventions, only to told by intelligence operatives that the treatment was standard procedure.
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The report, which has been confirmed as genuine by the International Committee of the Red Cross, suggests that mistreatment of prisoners went much farther than the "few wrongdoers" denounced by U.S. President George W. Bush.
Detainees walk past a mortar shelter in an outdoor detention centre in the Abu Ghraib Prison on the outskirts of Baghdad on Monday. (John Moore/AP)
On Monday, Mr. Bush repeated that line of defence, saying the vast majority of the troops in Iraq had been shamed by the dishonourable actions of a "small number" of soldiers. Mr. Bush also said that the military investigation into abuses sprang to life in January, "shortly after" these allegations became known. That appears to contradict the Red Cross report.
"These violations have been documented and sometimes observed while visiting prisoners of war, civilian internees and other persons protected by the Geneva Conventions ... in Iraq between March and November, 2003," the report reads.
Some improvements in prisoner treatment was made as a result of Red Cross pressure, the report says, but certain allegations of mistreatment continued to be collected by investigators.
"[Continuing allegations] suggested that the use of ill-treatment against persons deprived of their liberty went beyond exceptional cases and might be considered as a practice tolerated by [Coalition Forces]."
Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld — who said last week that he is willing to take "full responsibility" for the crisis but denied that he could no longer do his job effectively — got another ringing endorsement from Mr. Bush on Monday.
"Thank you for your leadership," Mr. Bush told his Defence Secretary after a briefing at the Pentagon. "...You're doing a superb job. You're a strong Secretary of Defence, and the nation owes you a debt of gratitude."
Also Monday, the lawyer for one of the women soldiers accused of involvement in the abuses at Abu Ghraib said that she was being scapegoated by her superiors.
"Because there was a shortage of personnel, the commander on the scene took people who had no idea how to be MPs and cut them off at the neck from their leadership," Giorgio Ra'Shadd told Associated Press.
"What is offensive to me is that we have generals and the Secretary of Defence hiding behind a 20-year-old farm girl from West Virginia who lives in a trailer park."
The scandal over series of photos showing U.S. soldiers degrading and humiliating their captives at Abu Ghraib prison, near Baghdad, has escalated steadily since CBS broke the story more than a week ago.
On Friday, amid calls for his resignation, Mr. Rumsfeld testified on Capitol Hills that that there were worse images to come. One of those appeared in the weekend New Yorker, a photo of two military dogs menacing a naked man cowering with his hands clasped behind his head. The accompanying article said that another photo showed the same man on the floor, bleeding profusely.
Investigators have taken possession of hundreds of photos and at least one videotape. The contents of this material have been described as "sadistic" by Mr. Rumsfeld, who viewed it last week before his testimony, and by a leading Republican politician as scenes of rape and murder.
Mr. Bush has reportedly asked to see all the images himself, so as not to be surprised if they surface publicly. Members of the U.S. Congress are also going to see the material, though it remains an open question whether it will be seen by the broader public. Members of both parties are urging the Pentagon to release the material.
Red Cross reports are not traditionally made public, a practice that has allowed the agency access to dark corners of the world it might otherwise have been denied.
