Iraq misses torture-allegation probe deadline

updated 6:17 p.m. ET Nov. 30, 2005

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraq’s government missed a two-week deadline Wednesday to complete an investigation into torture allegations at an Interior Ministry lockup, a probe that Amnesty International warned may show a pattern of abuse of prisoners by government forces.

The Shiite-led government has insisted the claims are exaggerated; nevertheless, the charges are discrediting U.S. efforts to restore human rights in the country after the collapse of Saddam Hussein’s regime.

A Sunni Arab politician, Mohammed al-Mishehdani of the Sunni-led National Council for National Dialogue, said simple cases of torture reported in the past were never solved, so he had few expectations for this investigation, especially since a general election is due in two weeks.

“We think that the government is not serious in this matter because it does not want to be dragged into controversy while the elections are looming,” he said.

The probe was launched after Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, a Shiite, disclosed on Nov. 15 that up to 173 prisoners — malnourished and some showing signs of torture — had been found in an Interior Ministry building seized by U.S. troops two days earlier.

Al-Jaafari’s pledge
Al-Jaafari promised that a high-level committee would complete a full investigation into conditions in Interior Ministry detention centers nationwide within two weeks.

On Wednesday, however, Deputy Interior Minister Hussein Kamal said the investigation was still under way. An aide to Deputy Prime Minister Rowsch Nouri Shaways, a Kurd who is heading the committee, said more time was needed.

A U.N. spokesman in Baghdad said the issue of alleged torture in government detention centers was raised in meetings U.N. special envoy Ashraf Jehangir Qazi held last week with al-Jaafari and President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd.

“We take these allegations very seriously and we raise them all the time,” U.N. spokesman Said Arikat told The Associated Press. “But we haven’t seen any action in terms of results.”

The failure to release results by the two-week deadline did not surprise Sunni Arab politicians. They have long complained of mass arrests and mistreatment of Sunni Arabs — the group that forms the backbone of a 30-month-old insurgency — by Iraq’s Shiite-dominated security forces.

“We believe that the government is part of this case, so we do not expect that it would try to reveal the truth,” said Harith al-Obeidi, a spokesman for the General Conference for the People of Iraq.

Human-rights group calls for action
Amnesty International spokeswoman Nicole Choueiry said the London-based rights group had repeatedly raised torture allegations with Iraqi authorities since last year but knew of no major attempt to get to the bottom of them.

“It’s an ongoing issue that needs to be addressed urgently. This month’s discovery may be the tip of the iceberg,” she said by telephone from London, adding that Amnesty has called on the government to allow the United Nations to investigate the claims.

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