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Top brass accept abuse blame
19/05/2004 17:13 - (SA)
Baghdad - A United States soldier was jailed for one year on Wednesday at his court martial for abusing Iraqi prisoners, as two generals commanding US-led forces in Iraq accepted responsibility for maltreatment shown in graphic pictures.
The pentagon said a further disc of pictures had been located, to add to three other CD-ROMs of digital photos and video clips.
In a bleak courtroom in Baghdad, prison guard Jeremy Sivits, 24, admitted he abused Iraqis in Abu Ghraib Prison and took at least one of the pictures of naked men whose public humiliation outraged the world and undermined US claims to bring democracy to Iraq.
In Washington, General John Abizaid, head of US central command, and Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez, commander of US land forces in Iraq, appeared before the senate armed forces committee to answer to the outrage.
"We have suffered a setback," Abizaid told the panel. "I accept responsibility for that setback."
Sanchez made similiar comments.
Will hold people accountable
"From evidence already gathered, we believe systemic problems existed at the prison that may have contributed to events there," said Abizaid.
"We will follow the trail of evidence wherever it leads, we will continue to correct systemic problems. We will hold people accountable."
Senator John Warner, chairperson of the committee, said he would advise them "on the conditions and time" when the new pictures could be viewed.
With many of the earlier pictures, said to show even worse abuse, still not made public, American justice went into the spotlight with Sivit's court martial.
It was open to the press, but with human rights groups complaining that their representatives were barred.
"Barring human rights monitors from the court martial is a bad decision in its own right," said Sarah Leah Whitson, executive director of Human Rights Watch's Middle East and North Africa division.
Against a background of allegations that senior officials knew of the abuse for months and did nothing, just four low-ranking soldiers have so far been charged.
Sivits was handed the maximum term of one year in jail after admitting conspiracy to maltreat detainees, maltreatment of detainees and dereliction of duty on November 8.
Three other soldiers allegedly involved in the abuse appeared for pre-trial hearing on Wednesday and will appear for another hearing on June 21.
Treated report 'in light-hearted manner'
Sergeant Javal Davis, staff sergeant Ivan Frederick and specialist Charles Graner face courts martial able to give tougher sentences than those available in the Sivits case.
But a US brigadier general said on Wednesday that many more senior officers knew of the abuse.
Janis Karpinski, in charge of military police guards at Abu Ghraib last year and who has been disciplined in the affair, said senior US officers treated an International Committee for the Red Cross report in "a light-hearted manner".
- AFP
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