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Baghdad:
Iraqi men held for months at a secret prison outside Baghdad were
systematically raped, electrocuted, beaten up and forced to sign
confession statements that they were forbidden to read, Human Rights
Watch (HRW) said on Wednesday in a harrowing report reminiscent of
the abuses that took place at Abu Ghraib.
Some of the detainees, mostly Sunnis from the northern city of Mosul,
were beaten by Iraqi guards so badly they lost teeth and urinated
blood for days afterward, said the report by New York-based HRW.
The watchdog interviewed 42 men who were recently transferred to
another detention facility in Baghdad, after details of misconduct
were passed to the government.
HRW described the prisoners’ accounts of abuse as “credible and
consistent,” said there must be an independent and impartial
investigation, and called for prosecutions at the highest level.
“The horror we found suggests torture was the norm in Muthanna,” the
watchdog’s deputy Middle East director Joe Stork said, referring to
the west Baghdad prison where the men were held until recently. “The
government needs to prosecute all those responsible for this
systematic brutality.”
The men held at the prison were suspected Sunni Arab insurgents from
the northern province of Nineveh, who had been arrested between
September and December last year, according to the HRW report.
The existence of the jail has caused alarm for Iraqi Prime Minister
Nuri Al-Maliki, whose officials said it was shut two weeks ago after
the abuse allegations were first published in the Los Angeles Times.
According to HRW, prison guards hung blindfolded detainees upside
down during interrogations, then kicked, whipped and beat them
before placing a dirty plastic bag over suspects’ heads to cut off
their air supply. When prisoners passed out, they were awoken by
electric shocks to their genitals or other parts of the body, the
report said.
The detainees, who were interviewed at the Al-Rusafa detention
facility in Baghdad on April 26, told HRW that interrogators and
security officials sodomized some detainees with broomsticks and
pistol barrels.
Some young men said they were whipped with heavy cables, burned with
acid and cigarettes, and had their teeth smashed.
Another detainee, who was 21, said interrogators threatened to rape
his mother and sisters if he did not confess. During one torture
session, guards made another detainee rape him.
“What happened at Muthanna is an example of the horrendous abuse
Iraqi leaders say they want to leave behind,” Stork said. “Everyone
responsible, from the top down, needs to be held accountable.”
One of eight detainee accounts published by HRW described how an
imprisoned doctor instructed guards that an abused cell mate, who he
suspected had internal bleeding, required urgent medical treatment.
“The guards took the tortured man out but returned him an hour later
saying that he was fine. He died in the cell an hour later,” it
said.
The HRW report bore similarities with the abuse that took place at
Abu Ghraib prison, west of Baghdad, in 2004, where a US military
unit tortured Iraqi prisoners in a scandal, which shocked the world.
Dalshad Zebari, a Kurdish lawmaker from Nineveh province, where most
of the detainees were from, said a government investigation was not
enough and there should be international involvement. “We will ask
the UN and the International Red Cross for an urgent investigation
of these human rights violations and to force the Iraqi government
to make public the names of those involved in these cruel crimes and
ensure they face justice.”
The revelation has come at a sensitive time for Al-Maliki as he
tries to negotiate alliances with other factions that would allow
him to be reappointed as prime minister following an inconclusive
election in March.
The Human Rights Ministry says three Iraqi Army officers have been
arrested for questioning. The prison was illegal because it was not
under the jurisdiction of the Justice Ministry and the Human Rights
Ministry was not informed of it.
Conditions in legal Iraqi prisons are often not much better. The
justice system relies on confessions for prosecutions, not evidence.
That makes torture common though perhaps not as routine as under
ousted dictator Saddam Hussein. The report has angered the Sunni
population who sees it as another example of persecution at the
hands of Shiite-led government.
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