Berg 'died for Bush sins'

2004-05-14 08:13

New York - The remains of Nicholas Berg, the US hostage beheaded by Islamic radicals in Iraq, arrived in the United States on Thursday as his father blamed President George W Bush for his death.

"Nicholas Berg died for the sins of George Bush and (Defense Secretary) Donald Rumsfeld," Michael Berg, visibly upset, told ABC television.

"The al-Qaeda people are probably just as bad as they are, but this administration did this," he said.

A private service for family and friends was scheduled for Friday afternoon at a synagogue just north of West Chester, Pennsylvania, where the Berg family lives.

Earlier this week, a grainy video on an Islamist website linked to the al-Qaeda terror network showed Berg, 26, being decapitated with a large knife by a group of masked men who claimed their action was in retaliation for the abuse of Iraqi prisoners.

"The al-Qaeda that killed my son didn't know what they were doing," Berg's father, Michael, told reporters camped outside his house Thursday. "They killed their best friend. Nick was there to build Iraq, not to tear it down. He was there to help people, not to hurt anyone."

The shocked disbelief voiced by Berg's family over his gruesome death has focused in part on numerous unanswered questions regarding his detention - prior to being taken hostage - by Iraqi police in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul.

US Brigadier General Carter Ham said in Mosul on Thursday that Berg had been held for two weeks, from March 25 to April 8, at the FBI's request "for travelling without documents" while his identity was checked.

He was eventually released "at the request of the state department, represented by the Coalition Provisional Authority," Ham said.

The worst of civil rights abuses

Berg's family, whose last contact with him was on April 9, said he was freed only after his parents filed suit in federal court in Philadelphia, contending that he was being held illegally by the US military.

Holding Nicholas Berg without charges for 13 days was "the worst of civil rights abuses and bureaucracy - and I think it's both of those things that got him," Michael Berg said on Tuesday.

The FBI and the US military "didn't care if they abused his rights, and they didn't care how long they abused them," he added.

The State Department said its last contact with Berg was on April 10, when a consular officer offered to help him leave Iraq by plane to Jordan.

"He told us that he planned to travel overland to Kuwait, and apparently he had made arrangements to do that," said state department spokesperson Richard Boucher.

Boucher said he could not speak for all federal agencies.

"But I can say that we tried to help Mr. Berg when he came to us," he said.

Michael Berg apparently holds very different views from those of his son, who supported the war in Iraq.

On Wednesday night, Michael Berg stuck a sign on the front lawn of his house that read: "War is not the answer."

- AFP