US military reluctant to probe prisoner abuse
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2005-11-16 22:52

The US military said Tuesday that it won't formally probe into whether US forces in Iraq put detainees in a cage with lions as Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld launched a verbal attack on Iraq war critics.

Two Iraqi businessmen, Sherzad Khalid, 35, and Thahe Sabbar, 37, made the allegation as part of a lawsuit against Rumsfeld and top US military commanders in Iraq filed by two rights groups, the American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights First.

US Army Spokesman Paul Boyce said there will be no formal investigation, adding that he has never heard of lions being used in any detainee operations.

He said that no mention of lions has ever come up in any of over 400 investigations into detainee abuse conducted by the military over the past three years.

"We are just somewhat perplexed that some 800 days after this incident allegedly occurred and these individuals were detained that this is the first time there's been any reference to a lion,"Boyce said.

However, the two former Iraqi detainees described a day in July2003, when they were arrested by US troops with guns and armored vehicles, they were covered with plastic hoods and repeatedly struck by soldiers using the butt of their guns.

They both described standing in front of a lion cage, and said they could hear other prisoners screaming as the metal cage door creaked open and slammed shut.

"They threatened that if I did not confess they would put me in the cage," said Khalid, adding that US soldiers kept asking him where Saddam Hussein was.

Failing to give an answer, he was then pushed into the cage three times, but were pulled out as the lions moved toward him.

Sabbar said he was also pushed into the cage. "The lions came running toward me and they (US soldiers) pulled me out and shut the door. I completely lost consciousness."

The United States faced international condemnation last year after photographs emerged showing American forces physically abusing and sexually humiliating Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib jail.

Asked about the newly emerged lion allegation, Rumsfeld said it seemed "quite farfetched."

Terrorists were trained to lie about how they were treated while imprisoned, he said at a Pentagon press conference.

Asked by a reporter whether he was saying the lion incident never happened, Rumsfeld responded, "I didn't say that. You heard precisely what I said. I spoke very precisely. And you can get a transcript of it if you really want to know what I said."

With Democrats stepping up accusations that US President George W. Bush had misled the American public about the urgency of the Iraqi threat prior to his order to invade in March 2003, Rumsfeld launched a verbal attack on Iraq War critics.

He argued at the press conference that when the Democrats were in power, they also supported efforts to topple Saddam.

He noted that former President Bill Clinton, a Democrat, signed The Iraq Liberation Act and ordered four days of bombing of that country in December 1998.

Rumsfeld also cited the words of Clinton, former Vice President Al Gore, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and Sandy Berger, Clinton's national security adviser, to prove his argument.

He said that flawed intelligence offered by the Bush administration on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction was based on "honest mistakes."

Meanwhile, the Republican-controlled Senate defeated on Tuesdaya Democratic proposal to call for Bush to draw a timetable for a phased withdrawal of US troops from Iraq.

The vote result was 58-40 as the Republicans enjoy a clear majority in the Senate.

In response, the Republicans put forward their own initiative, urging that the Iraqi forces should take the lead in defending their nation and there should be "a period of significant transition to full Iraqi sovereignty" in 2006.

Asked whether the vote signaled a growing impatience with the Iraqi war similar to that sparked more than three decades ago by the US war in Vietnam, Rumsfeld ejected any direct comparison between the two wars.

"Oh, I wouldn't go down that road myself," he said.

In Iraq, a suicide bomber attacked a military checkpoint south of Baghdad on Tuesday, killing at least three US National Guards, a police source told Xinhua.

The death has brought to over 2,050 the number of US military personnel who have died in Iraq since the US-led invasion in March 2003, according to media tally. Enditem

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