adios
05-07-2004, 05:08 PM
A WSJ exclusive, first the story then excerpts from the report.
Red Cross Found
Widespread Abuse
Of Iraqi Prisoners
Confidential Report Says
Agency Briefed U.S. Officials
On Concerns Repeatedly
By DAVID S. CLOUD, CARLA ANNE ROBBINS and GREG JAFFE
Staff Reporters of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
May 7, 2004 3:13 p.m.
WASHINGTON -- A confidential and previously undisclosed Red Cross report delivered to the Bush administration earlier this year concluded that abuse of prisoners in Iraq in custody of U.S. military intelligence was widespread and in some cases "tantamount to torture."
Among other allegations, the report says prisoners were kept naked in empty cells at Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison; that prisoners were beaten by coalition forces, in one case leading to death; that coalition forces fired on unarmed prisoners multiple times from watchtowers, killing some of them; and that coalition forces committed "serious violations" of the Geneva Conventions governing treatment of prisoners of war.
Overall, the 24-page report, based on International Committee of the Red Cross inspections and interviews in Iraq from March to November 2003, alleges that prisoners in intelligence interrogations were subjected to harsh and often brutal treatment as part of a regular practice of trying to "obtain confessions and extract information."
The February report, reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, presents a portrait of prisoner treatment in Iraq that is at odds with statements by administration officials that abuse wasn't condoned by military commanders and was limited to a handful of low-ranking soldiers.
Instead, the report says, information gathered by the ICRC "suggested the use of ill-treatment against persons deprived of their liberty went beyond exceptional cases and might be considered a practice tolerated by" coalition forces.
Pentagon officials declined to comment, saying that they had a confidentiality agreement with the ICRC that prevented them from discussing the report. The head of the Geneva-based agency's delegation in Washington, Christophe Girod, Thursday night said he couldn't comment on the report, which he said was "confidential" and intended only for the U.S. and its coalition partners.
The ICRC did acknowledge Thursday that it had documented prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib, and said it had been working with U.S. officials to correct the problem before the scandal broke. "The American authorities took very seriously all our recommendations," Nada Doumani, spokeswoman for the International Committee of the Red Cross, while not providing a copy of the report, told the Associated Press from Amman, Jordan.
In a statement Friday about The Wall Street Journal article, ICRC President Jakob Kellenberger said: "I am profoundly disturbed that the report was made available for publication without the consent of the ICRC. The ICRC fulfils its mandate to protect persons detained in armed conflict by addressing problems and violations through private approaches to the detaining authorities and their superiors. This long-standing practice allows us to act in a decisive manner, while ensuring that our delegates have continued access to detainees around the world."
"These findings clearly underline the necessity for the authorities concerned to strike a balance between the legitimate security concerns of States and the protection of human dignity. This lies at the heart of international humanitarian law, which must be preserved, upheld and promoted at all times." Mr. Kellenberger said. "The ICRC reiterates its firm intention of continuing to help all persons protected by international humanitarian law in all areas of armed conflict, remaining true to its established principles and practice."
The U.S. Army, which was in regular contact with ICRC about its allegations, launched an inquiry into conditions at Abu Ghraib on Jan. 14, the day after photos of abused prisoners were passed up the chain of command. Some of the photos have become public in the last week, stirring anger at the U.S. around the world and spurring new questions about the war and occupation.
It could not be learned last night how widely read the ICRC report was among senior Bush administration officials. U.S. officials said yesterday that Secretary of State Colin Powell, for instance, had raised the problems with detention procedures at several high-level administration meetings this year. A State Department official said last night that he couldn't say when Mr. Powell first saw the report. But he noted that the ICRC had been making recommendations and raising concerns for a long time, and that Mr. Powell and other administration officials had been aware of that.
The ICRC report specifies that its findings were made available to the U.S. as part of a "bilateral and confidential dialogue."
A spokesman for U.S. Central Command, which oversees U.S. troops in the Middle East, said the command had not received the report.
The report says Red Cross officials repeatedly briefed U.S. officials about their concerns regarding prisoner mistreatment beginning just after the war ended in May and continuing until the report was completed in February.
In mid-October, ICRC officials visited a section of Abu Ghraib where they witnessed "the practice of keeping persons completely naked in totally empty concrete cells in total darkness, allegedly for several consecutive days," the report says.
Upon witnessing the treatment in the prison, which included making male prisoners parade around in women's underwear, ICRC officials complained to the military intelligence officer in charge, who explained that the practice was "part of the process," the report says.
Despite the ICRC's October inspection and warning of abuse at Abu Ghraib in October 2003, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told reporters earlier this week that the allegations of guards sexually humiliating and abusing inmates at the facility didn't surface until Jan. 13, three months after the ICRC complained of the problem to military officials in Iraq.
In another episode detailed in the report, nine men were arrested by coalition forces in the city of Basra last September and taken to offices formerly used by the Iraqi intelligence service. There, according to allegations gathered by the ICRC, they were "beaten severely by [Coalition Forces] personnel."
One of those arrested, 28-year-old Baha Daoud Salim, died. "His co-arrestees heard him screaming and asking for assistance," the report says.
His death certificate, prepared by coalition forces, listed "cardio-respiratory arrest-asphyxia" as the condition leading to death, but said the cause of death was "unknown," the report says. An eyewitness description of the body reported a broken nose, several broken ribs and lesions on the face consistent with a beating, it notes.
The report also documents eight instances in which coalition forces opened fire -- in some cases from watchtowers -- on unarmed prisoners, killing seven of them and wounding as many as 20. "These incidents were investigated summarily by the coalition forces," the report states, noting that in all cases the coalition determined that "a legitimate use of firearms had been made."
The ICRC, however, disagreed, saying that in all cases "less extreme measures could have been used to quell the demonstrations," according to the report. In one case, a prisoner throwing stones was shot through the chest by a guard in a watchtower. The military said the shooting was justified. The ICRC, however, said the shooting "showed a clear disregard for human life and security" of prisoners.
The ICRC does not typically publicly release the findings of its inspections, a policy that the organization says is critical for it to gain access to prisons, hospitals and other facilities in war zones. Disclosure of the report's details could well raise questions about the ICRC's policy of maintaining confidentiality even in the face of such abuse.
The report does document cases in which ICRC complaints achieved changes in practices. In May 2003, it says, after a memo detailing 200 allegations of mistreatment was given to Rear Adm. James Robb, non-Iraqi detainees were no longer forced to wear wristbands that read "terrorist."
The report notes that "ill-treatment during interrogation was not systematic, except with regard to persons arrested with suspected security offenses or deemed to have an intelligence value." Treatment of prisoners in military intelligence custody improved if they cooperated, the report says. It notes that when prisoners were transferred to facilities under control of military police, treatment also generally improved.
Last July, the ICRC sent the U.S. a report detailing 50 allegations of prisoner abuse at the military intelligence section of Camp Cropper, at Baghdad International Airport. Detainees were subjected to a variety of techniques aimed at pressuring them, the report says.
They included soldiers "taking aim at individuals with rifles, striking them with rifle butts, slaps and punches and prolonged exposure to the sun." One prisoner claimed he was "urinated on, kicked in the head, lower back and groin, force-fed a baseball, which was tied into the mouth using a scarf and deprived of sleep for four consecutive days."
Excerpts from the Red Cross report.
Excerpts From Red Cross Report
May 7, 2004
Excerpts from the EXECUTIVE SUMMARY of "Report of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) on the Treatment by the Coalition Forces of Prisoners of War and Other Protected Persons by the Geneva Conventions in Iraq During Arrest, Internment and Interrogation"
February 2004
The ICRC draws the attention of the Coalition Forces (hereafter called "the CF") to a number of serious violations of International Humanitarian Law. These violations have been documented and sometimes observed while visiting prisoners of war, civilian internees and other protected persons by the Geneva Conventions…in Iraq between March and November 2003. During its visits to places of internment of the CF, the ICRC collected allegations during private interviews with persons deprived of their liberty….
The main violations, which are described in the ICRC report and presented confidentially to the CF, include:
• Brutality against protected persons upon capture and initial custody, sometimes causing death or serious injury
• Absence of notification of arrest of persons…to their families….
• Physical or psychological coercion during interrogation to secure information
• Prolonged solitary confinement in cells devoid of daylight
• Excessive and disproportionate use of force against persons deprived of their liberty resulting in death or injury during their period of internment
Serious problems of conduct by the CF that affected persons deprived of their liberty are also presented in the report
• Seizure and confiscation of private belongings…
• Exposure of persons deprived of their liberty to dangerous tasks
• Holding persons deprived of their liberty in dangerous places where they are not protected from shelling
According to allegations collected by ICRC delegates during private interviews with persons deprived of their liberty, ill-treatment during capture was frequent. While certain circumstances might require defensive precautions and the use of force on the part of ballet group units, the ICRC collected allegations of ill-treatment following capture which took place in Baghdad, Basrah, Ramadi and Tikrit, indicating a consistent pattern with respect to times and places of brutal behavior during arrest. The repetition of such behavior by CF appeared to go beyond the reasonable, legitimate and proportional use of force required to apprehend suspects or restrain persons resisting arrest or capture, and seemed to reflect a usual modus operandi by certain CF battle groups.
According to the allegations collected by the ICRC, ill-treatment during interrogation was not systematic, except with regard to persons arrested in connection with suspected security offences or deemed to have an "intelligence" value. In these cases, persons deprived of their liberty under supervision of Military Intelligence were at high risk of being subjected to a variety of harsh treatments ranging from insults, threats and humiliations to both physical and psychological coercion, which in some cases was tantamount to torture, in order to force cooperation with their interrogators.
The ICRC also started to document what appeared to be widespread abuse of power and ill-treatment by the Iraqi police, which is under the supervision of the Occupying Power, including threats to hand over persons in their custody to the CF so as to extort money from them….
In the case of "High Value Detainees" held in Baghdad International Airport, the continued internment, several months after their arrest, in strict solitary confinement in cells devoid of sunlight for nearly 23 hours a day constituted a serious violation of the Third and Fourth Geneva Conventions.
The ICRC was also concerned about the excessive and disproportionate use of force by some detaining authorities … during periods of unrest or escape attempts that caused death and serious injuries. The use of firearms against persons deprived of their liberty in circumstances where methods without using firearms could have yielded the same result could amount to a serious violation of International Humanitarian Law. The ICRC reviewed a number of incidents of shootings of persons deprived of their liberty with live bullets, which have resulted in deaths or injuries during periods of unrest related to conditions of internment or escape attempts. Investigations initiated by the CF into these incidents concluded that the use of firearms against persons deprived of their liberty was legitimate. However, non-lethal measures could have been used to obtain the same results….
Since the beginning of the conflict, the ICRC has regularly brought its concerns to the attention of the CF. The observations in the present report are consistent with those made earlier on several occasions orally and in writing to the CF throughout 2003. In spite of some improvements in the material conditions of internment, allegations of ill-treatment perpetuated by members of the CF against persons deprived of their liberty continued to be collected by the ICRC and thus suggested that the use of ill-treatment against persons deprived of their liberty went beyond exceptional causes and might be considered as a practice tolerated by the CF.
* * *
The following is from the body of the report:
The main places of internment where mistreatment allegedly took place included battle group unit stations; the military intelligence sections of Camp Cropper and Abu Ghraib Correctional Facility; Al-Baghdadi, Heat Base and Hubbania Camp in Ramadi governorate; Tikrit holding area (former Saddam Hussein Islamic School); a former train station Al-Khaim, near the Syrian border, turned into a military base; the Ministry of Defense and Presidential Palace in Baghdad, the former mukhabarat office in Basrah, as well as several Iraqi police stations in Baghdad.
TREATMENT DURING INTERROGATION
Methods of Ill-Treatment
• Hooding, used to prevent people from seeing and to disorient them, and also to prevent them from breathing freely. One or sometimes two bags, sometimes with an elastic blindfold over the eyes which, when slipped down, further impeded proper breathing. Hooding was sometimes used in conjunction with beatings thus increasing anxiety as to when blows would come. The practice of hooding also allowed the interrogators to remain anonymous and thus to act with impunity. Hooding could last for periods from a few hours to up to two to four consecutive days, during which hoods were lifted only for drinking, eating or going to the toilets
• Handcuffing with flexi-cuffs, which were sometimes made so tight and used for such extended periods that they caused skin lesions and long-term aftereffects on the hands (nerve damage), as observed by the ICRC
• Beating with hard objects (including pistols and rifles), slapping, punching, kicking with knees or feet on various parts of the body (legs, sides, lower back, groin)
• Pressing the face into the ground with boots
• Threats (of ill-treatment, reprisals against family members, imminent executive or transfer to Guantanamo)
• Being stripped naked for several days while held in solitary confinement in an empty and completely dark cell that included a latrine
• Being paraded naked outside cells in front of other persons deprived of their liberty and guards, sometimes hooded or with women's underwear over the head
• Acts of humiliation such as being made to stand naked against the wall of the cell with arms raised or with women's underwear over the head for prolonged periods, while being laughed at by guards, including female guards, and sometimes photographed in this position
• Being attached repeatedly over several days, for several hours each time, with handcuffs to the bars of their cell door in humiliating (i.e. naked or in underwear) and/or uncomfortable position causing physical pain
• Exposure while hooded to loud noise or music, prolonged exposure while hooded to the sun over several hours, including during the hottest time of the day when temperatures could reach 50 degrees Celsius (122 degrees Fahrenheit) or higher
• Being forced to remain for prolonged periods in stress positions such as squatting or standing with or without the arms lifted
These methods of physical and psychological coercion were used by the military intelligence in a systematic way to gain confessions and extract information or other forms of cooperation from persons who had been arrested in connection with suspected security offences or deemed to have an "intelligence value."
Red Cross Found
Widespread Abuse
Of Iraqi Prisoners
Confidential Report Says
Agency Briefed U.S. Officials
On Concerns Repeatedly
By DAVID S. CLOUD, CARLA ANNE ROBBINS and GREG JAFFE
Staff Reporters of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
May 7, 2004 3:13 p.m.
WASHINGTON -- A confidential and previously undisclosed Red Cross report delivered to the Bush administration earlier this year concluded that abuse of prisoners in Iraq in custody of U.S. military intelligence was widespread and in some cases "tantamount to torture."
Among other allegations, the report says prisoners were kept naked in empty cells at Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison; that prisoners were beaten by coalition forces, in one case leading to death; that coalition forces fired on unarmed prisoners multiple times from watchtowers, killing some of them; and that coalition forces committed "serious violations" of the Geneva Conventions governing treatment of prisoners of war.
Overall, the 24-page report, based on International Committee of the Red Cross inspections and interviews in Iraq from March to November 2003, alleges that prisoners in intelligence interrogations were subjected to harsh and often brutal treatment as part of a regular practice of trying to "obtain confessions and extract information."
The February report, reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, presents a portrait of prisoner treatment in Iraq that is at odds with statements by administration officials that abuse wasn't condoned by military commanders and was limited to a handful of low-ranking soldiers.
Instead, the report says, information gathered by the ICRC "suggested the use of ill-treatment against persons deprived of their liberty went beyond exceptional cases and might be considered a practice tolerated by" coalition forces.
Pentagon officials declined to comment, saying that they had a confidentiality agreement with the ICRC that prevented them from discussing the report. The head of the Geneva-based agency's delegation in Washington, Christophe Girod, Thursday night said he couldn't comment on the report, which he said was "confidential" and intended only for the U.S. and its coalition partners.
The ICRC did acknowledge Thursday that it had documented prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib, and said it had been working with U.S. officials to correct the problem before the scandal broke. "The American authorities took very seriously all our recommendations," Nada Doumani, spokeswoman for the International Committee of the Red Cross, while not providing a copy of the report, told the Associated Press from Amman, Jordan.
In a statement Friday about The Wall Street Journal article, ICRC President Jakob Kellenberger said: "I am profoundly disturbed that the report was made available for publication without the consent of the ICRC. The ICRC fulfils its mandate to protect persons detained in armed conflict by addressing problems and violations through private approaches to the detaining authorities and their superiors. This long-standing practice allows us to act in a decisive manner, while ensuring that our delegates have continued access to detainees around the world."
"These findings clearly underline the necessity for the authorities concerned to strike a balance between the legitimate security concerns of States and the protection of human dignity. This lies at the heart of international humanitarian law, which must be preserved, upheld and promoted at all times." Mr. Kellenberger said. "The ICRC reiterates its firm intention of continuing to help all persons protected by international humanitarian law in all areas of armed conflict, remaining true to its established principles and practice."
The U.S. Army, which was in regular contact with ICRC about its allegations, launched an inquiry into conditions at Abu Ghraib on Jan. 14, the day after photos of abused prisoners were passed up the chain of command. Some of the photos have become public in the last week, stirring anger at the U.S. around the world and spurring new questions about the war and occupation.
It could not be learned last night how widely read the ICRC report was among senior Bush administration officials. U.S. officials said yesterday that Secretary of State Colin Powell, for instance, had raised the problems with detention procedures at several high-level administration meetings this year. A State Department official said last night that he couldn't say when Mr. Powell first saw the report. But he noted that the ICRC had been making recommendations and raising concerns for a long time, and that Mr. Powell and other administration officials had been aware of that.
The ICRC report specifies that its findings were made available to the U.S. as part of a "bilateral and confidential dialogue."
A spokesman for U.S. Central Command, which oversees U.S. troops in the Middle East, said the command had not received the report.
The report says Red Cross officials repeatedly briefed U.S. officials about their concerns regarding prisoner mistreatment beginning just after the war ended in May and continuing until the report was completed in February.
In mid-October, ICRC officials visited a section of Abu Ghraib where they witnessed "the practice of keeping persons completely naked in totally empty concrete cells in total darkness, allegedly for several consecutive days," the report says.
Upon witnessing the treatment in the prison, which included making male prisoners parade around in women's underwear, ICRC officials complained to the military intelligence officer in charge, who explained that the practice was "part of the process," the report says.
Despite the ICRC's October inspection and warning of abuse at Abu Ghraib in October 2003, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told reporters earlier this week that the allegations of guards sexually humiliating and abusing inmates at the facility didn't surface until Jan. 13, three months after the ICRC complained of the problem to military officials in Iraq.
In another episode detailed in the report, nine men were arrested by coalition forces in the city of Basra last September and taken to offices formerly used by the Iraqi intelligence service. There, according to allegations gathered by the ICRC, they were "beaten severely by [Coalition Forces] personnel."
One of those arrested, 28-year-old Baha Daoud Salim, died. "His co-arrestees heard him screaming and asking for assistance," the report says.
His death certificate, prepared by coalition forces, listed "cardio-respiratory arrest-asphyxia" as the condition leading to death, but said the cause of death was "unknown," the report says. An eyewitness description of the body reported a broken nose, several broken ribs and lesions on the face consistent with a beating, it notes.
The report also documents eight instances in which coalition forces opened fire -- in some cases from watchtowers -- on unarmed prisoners, killing seven of them and wounding as many as 20. "These incidents were investigated summarily by the coalition forces," the report states, noting that in all cases the coalition determined that "a legitimate use of firearms had been made."
The ICRC, however, disagreed, saying that in all cases "less extreme measures could have been used to quell the demonstrations," according to the report. In one case, a prisoner throwing stones was shot through the chest by a guard in a watchtower. The military said the shooting was justified. The ICRC, however, said the shooting "showed a clear disregard for human life and security" of prisoners.
The ICRC does not typically publicly release the findings of its inspections, a policy that the organization says is critical for it to gain access to prisons, hospitals and other facilities in war zones. Disclosure of the report's details could well raise questions about the ICRC's policy of maintaining confidentiality even in the face of such abuse.
The report does document cases in which ICRC complaints achieved changes in practices. In May 2003, it says, after a memo detailing 200 allegations of mistreatment was given to Rear Adm. James Robb, non-Iraqi detainees were no longer forced to wear wristbands that read "terrorist."
The report notes that "ill-treatment during interrogation was not systematic, except with regard to persons arrested with suspected security offenses or deemed to have an intelligence value." Treatment of prisoners in military intelligence custody improved if they cooperated, the report says. It notes that when prisoners were transferred to facilities under control of military police, treatment also generally improved.
Last July, the ICRC sent the U.S. a report detailing 50 allegations of prisoner abuse at the military intelligence section of Camp Cropper, at Baghdad International Airport. Detainees were subjected to a variety of techniques aimed at pressuring them, the report says.
They included soldiers "taking aim at individuals with rifles, striking them with rifle butts, slaps and punches and prolonged exposure to the sun." One prisoner claimed he was "urinated on, kicked in the head, lower back and groin, force-fed a baseball, which was tied into the mouth using a scarf and deprived of sleep for four consecutive days."
Excerpts from the Red Cross report.
Excerpts From Red Cross Report
May 7, 2004
Excerpts from the EXECUTIVE SUMMARY of "Report of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) on the Treatment by the Coalition Forces of Prisoners of War and Other Protected Persons by the Geneva Conventions in Iraq During Arrest, Internment and Interrogation"
February 2004
The ICRC draws the attention of the Coalition Forces (hereafter called "the CF") to a number of serious violations of International Humanitarian Law. These violations have been documented and sometimes observed while visiting prisoners of war, civilian internees and other protected persons by the Geneva Conventions…in Iraq between March and November 2003. During its visits to places of internment of the CF, the ICRC collected allegations during private interviews with persons deprived of their liberty….
The main violations, which are described in the ICRC report and presented confidentially to the CF, include:
• Brutality against protected persons upon capture and initial custody, sometimes causing death or serious injury
• Absence of notification of arrest of persons…to their families….
• Physical or psychological coercion during interrogation to secure information
• Prolonged solitary confinement in cells devoid of daylight
• Excessive and disproportionate use of force against persons deprived of their liberty resulting in death or injury during their period of internment
Serious problems of conduct by the CF that affected persons deprived of their liberty are also presented in the report
• Seizure and confiscation of private belongings…
• Exposure of persons deprived of their liberty to dangerous tasks
• Holding persons deprived of their liberty in dangerous places where they are not protected from shelling
According to allegations collected by ICRC delegates during private interviews with persons deprived of their liberty, ill-treatment during capture was frequent. While certain circumstances might require defensive precautions and the use of force on the part of ballet group units, the ICRC collected allegations of ill-treatment following capture which took place in Baghdad, Basrah, Ramadi and Tikrit, indicating a consistent pattern with respect to times and places of brutal behavior during arrest. The repetition of such behavior by CF appeared to go beyond the reasonable, legitimate and proportional use of force required to apprehend suspects or restrain persons resisting arrest or capture, and seemed to reflect a usual modus operandi by certain CF battle groups.
According to the allegations collected by the ICRC, ill-treatment during interrogation was not systematic, except with regard to persons arrested in connection with suspected security offences or deemed to have an "intelligence" value. In these cases, persons deprived of their liberty under supervision of Military Intelligence were at high risk of being subjected to a variety of harsh treatments ranging from insults, threats and humiliations to both physical and psychological coercion, which in some cases was tantamount to torture, in order to force cooperation with their interrogators.
The ICRC also started to document what appeared to be widespread abuse of power and ill-treatment by the Iraqi police, which is under the supervision of the Occupying Power, including threats to hand over persons in their custody to the CF so as to extort money from them….
In the case of "High Value Detainees" held in Baghdad International Airport, the continued internment, several months after their arrest, in strict solitary confinement in cells devoid of sunlight for nearly 23 hours a day constituted a serious violation of the Third and Fourth Geneva Conventions.
The ICRC was also concerned about the excessive and disproportionate use of force by some detaining authorities … during periods of unrest or escape attempts that caused death and serious injuries. The use of firearms against persons deprived of their liberty in circumstances where methods without using firearms could have yielded the same result could amount to a serious violation of International Humanitarian Law. The ICRC reviewed a number of incidents of shootings of persons deprived of their liberty with live bullets, which have resulted in deaths or injuries during periods of unrest related to conditions of internment or escape attempts. Investigations initiated by the CF into these incidents concluded that the use of firearms against persons deprived of their liberty was legitimate. However, non-lethal measures could have been used to obtain the same results….
Since the beginning of the conflict, the ICRC has regularly brought its concerns to the attention of the CF. The observations in the present report are consistent with those made earlier on several occasions orally and in writing to the CF throughout 2003. In spite of some improvements in the material conditions of internment, allegations of ill-treatment perpetuated by members of the CF against persons deprived of their liberty continued to be collected by the ICRC and thus suggested that the use of ill-treatment against persons deprived of their liberty went beyond exceptional causes and might be considered as a practice tolerated by the CF.
* * *
The following is from the body of the report:
The main places of internment where mistreatment allegedly took place included battle group unit stations; the military intelligence sections of Camp Cropper and Abu Ghraib Correctional Facility; Al-Baghdadi, Heat Base and Hubbania Camp in Ramadi governorate; Tikrit holding area (former Saddam Hussein Islamic School); a former train station Al-Khaim, near the Syrian border, turned into a military base; the Ministry of Defense and Presidential Palace in Baghdad, the former mukhabarat office in Basrah, as well as several Iraqi police stations in Baghdad.
TREATMENT DURING INTERROGATION
Methods of Ill-Treatment
• Hooding, used to prevent people from seeing and to disorient them, and also to prevent them from breathing freely. One or sometimes two bags, sometimes with an elastic blindfold over the eyes which, when slipped down, further impeded proper breathing. Hooding was sometimes used in conjunction with beatings thus increasing anxiety as to when blows would come. The practice of hooding also allowed the interrogators to remain anonymous and thus to act with impunity. Hooding could last for periods from a few hours to up to two to four consecutive days, during which hoods were lifted only for drinking, eating or going to the toilets
• Handcuffing with flexi-cuffs, which were sometimes made so tight and used for such extended periods that they caused skin lesions and long-term aftereffects on the hands (nerve damage), as observed by the ICRC
• Beating with hard objects (including pistols and rifles), slapping, punching, kicking with knees or feet on various parts of the body (legs, sides, lower back, groin)
• Pressing the face into the ground with boots
• Threats (of ill-treatment, reprisals against family members, imminent executive or transfer to Guantanamo)
• Being stripped naked for several days while held in solitary confinement in an empty and completely dark cell that included a latrine
• Being paraded naked outside cells in front of other persons deprived of their liberty and guards, sometimes hooded or with women's underwear over the head
• Acts of humiliation such as being made to stand naked against the wall of the cell with arms raised or with women's underwear over the head for prolonged periods, while being laughed at by guards, including female guards, and sometimes photographed in this position
• Being attached repeatedly over several days, for several hours each time, with handcuffs to the bars of their cell door in humiliating (i.e. naked or in underwear) and/or uncomfortable position causing physical pain
• Exposure while hooded to loud noise or music, prolonged exposure while hooded to the sun over several hours, including during the hottest time of the day when temperatures could reach 50 degrees Celsius (122 degrees Fahrenheit) or higher
• Being forced to remain for prolonged periods in stress positions such as squatting or standing with or without the arms lifted
These methods of physical and psychological coercion were used by the military intelligence in a systematic way to gain confessions and extract information or other forms of cooperation from persons who had been arrested in connection with suspected security offences or deemed to have an "intelligence value."