- BAGHDAD -- The families of
senior Iraqis captured by the US since the fall of Saddam complained last
night that their relatives had been wrongly identified as important members
of the regime and that some had been tortured while in custody.
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- In interviews with the Guardian, the families said that
their relatives had been held without charge for as long as eight months,
and that their only contact with loved ones was through Red Cross letters.
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- It would be difficult, if not impossible, for them to
get a fair trial because the US had refused to allow them to see lawyers,
they added.
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- American troops have so far captured or killed 42 of
the original "55 most wanted" members of the ousted Iraqi regime
- including Saddam Hussein - who were emblazoned by the US on a pack of
playing cards.
-
- Last night, however, relatives claimed that many of the
55 had not committed atrocities during the Saddam years, while others who
were, in fact, to blame had escaped American attention.
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- The prisoners have been classified as "security
internees" and are now believed to be in a high-security US military
prison at Baghdad international airport.
-
- And the relatives claimed that, although conditions have
now improved, US troops tortured several prisoners during the first days
of interrogation.
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- Yesterday Mohammed al-Faysal, whose father Sa'ad al-Faysal
was formerly Iraq's ambassador to Moscow, said he was baffled by his detention.
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- His father - number 55 on the list, and the three of
spades - was recalled by Saddam days before the war broke out and made
a Ba'ath party commander, following 30 years abroad as a diplomat. US troops
arrested him seven months ago, together with his nephew.
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- "The person who interrogated them was from Lebanon.
He asked my cousin what his relationship with my father was. They kept
him in detention for two weeks. He was blindfolded, handcuffed and keep
in a dark room with no light. It was very hot. They tortured them by making
them raise their arms in the air for several hours until they fainted."
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- He added: "My cousin heard screaming sounds coming
from the next room. He didn't know whether this was real or the sound from
a tape."
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- The Pentagon denies using torture on the 5,000 Iraqi
prisoners who have been rounded up since the US-led invasion of Iraq, though
it does admit using sleep deprivation.
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- Last night Badie Arief Izzat, a senior Baghdad lawyer
who represents 20 of the most wanted 55, claimed that at least one detainee
who was subsequently released had been beaten up while in US custody.
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- "They kept him in a small dark room with his arms
in the air. When they were sleeping a US soldier came in and started to
kick the prisoners," he said.
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- Mr Izzat, who has been contacted by Saddam's daughters
to discuss their father's defence, said none of the "most wanted"
had been allowed access to a lawyer.
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- He had raised the issue with Paul Bremer, the Bush administration's
top official in Iraq, but failed to get a reply.
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- "This kind of justice isn't very different from
Iraqi justice under Saddam," the lawyer complained.
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- Several letters sent by prisoners had gone missing following
a bomb attack on the Red Cross's Baghdad office in October, which forced
the organisation to pull out of Iraq, he added.
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- * At least two people were killed and 16 wounded yesterday
when Kurdish gunmen opened fire on a demonstration in the northern Iraqi
city of Kirkuk.
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- The demonstrators had been protesting against Kurdish
plans to include the ethnically divided city in a new Kurdish federation.
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- Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited
2004
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- http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1114482,00.html
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