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15:12 GMT
LONDON, April 2 (KUNA) -- British soldiers and airmen who helped to operate
a secretive US detention facility in Baghdad that was at the centre of some of
the most serious human rights abuses to occur in Iraq after the invasion have,
for the first time, spoken about abuses they witnessed there, it was revealed
here Tuesday.
Personnel from two Royal Air Force squadrons and one Army Air Corps
squadron were given guard and transport duties at the secret prison, the
Guardian newspaper said in an exclusive report. And many of the detainees were
brought to the facility by snatch squads formed from Special Air Service and
Special Boat Service squadrons.
Codenamed "Task Force 121", the joint US-UK special forces unit was at
first deployed to detain individuals thought to have information about Saddam
Hussein's weapons of mass destruction.
Once it was realised that Saddam's regime had long since abandoned its WMD
programme, TF 121 was re-tasked with tracking down people who might know where
the deposed dictator and his loyalists might be, and then with catching
al-Qaida leaders who sprang up in the country after the regime collapsed, the
newspaper added.
Suspects were brought to the secret prison at Baghdad International
airport, known as Camp Nama, for questioning by US military and civilian
interrogators. "But the methods used were so brutal that they drew
condemnation not only from a US human rights body but from a special
investigator reporting to the Pentagon".
A British serviceman who served at Nama recalled: "I saw one man having his
prosthetic leg being pulled off him, and being beaten about the head with it
before he was thrown on to the truck."
On the 10th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, a number of former members
of TF 121 and its successor unit TF6-26 have come forward to describe the
abuses they witnessed, and to state that they complained about the
mistreatment of detainees.
The abuses they say they saw include: Iraqi prisoners being held for
prolonged periods in cells the size of large dog kennels.
Prisoners being subjected to electric shocks, routinely hooded, taken into
a sound-proofed shipping container for interrogation, and emerging in a state
of physical distress.
It is unclear how many of their complaints were registered or passed up the
chain of command. A Ministry of Defence spokesperson said a search of its
records did not turn up "anything specific" about complaints from British
personnel at Camp Nama, or anything that substantiated such complaints.
Nevertheless, the emergence of evidence of British involvement in the
running of such a notorious detention facility appears to raise fresh
questions about ministerial approval of operations that resulted in serious
human rights abuses, the daily pointed out.
Geoff Hoon, defence secretary at the time, insisted he had no knowledge of
Camp Nama. When it was pointed out to him that the British military had
provided transport services and a guard force, and had helped to detain Nama's
inmates, he replied: "I've never heard of the place."
The MoD, on the other hand, repeatedly failed to address questions about
ministerial approval of British operations at Camp Nama. Nor would the
department say whether ministers had been made aware of concerns about human
rights abuses there.
Former army officer Crispin Blunt accused defence secretary John Hutton in
2009 of sweeping under the carpet the evidence of direct British service
involvement, the Guardian recalled. (end)
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