Fears raised that captives face torture

FEARS grew yesterday that US troops captured in Iraq could face torture and sexual abuse.

Officials are concerned that Saddam Hussein’s regime will repeat its brutal treatment of previous prisoners of war. They are especially worried about the wounded female soldier who was one of five terrified troops paraded on Iraqi TV Sunday.

“It’s bad when a man is captured, but if a woman is captured, she doesn’t have the same chance to defend herself that a man does,” Elaine Donnelly, president of the Military Readiness Centre, told the Washington Times.

Major Rhonda Cornum, a US flight surgeon who was captured in the last Gulf War, said four years after her release that she had been sexually assaulted by Iraqis.

US President George W Bush has said he expects all prisoners to be treated humanely and warned that anyone that fails to do so will be punished as a war criminal. However, Iraq has a long history of torturing both military and domestic captives.

British pilots John Peters and John Nichol suffered physical and psychological abuse when taken prisoner after bailing out from their Tornado in the Gulf War.

A group of 17 US servicemen also seized in 1991 are currently suing the Iraqi government claiming they were given electric shock torture.

Iran has said that tens of thousands of its soldiers were subjected to severe torture during the conflict with Iraq in the 1980s.

Amnesty International and the UN Commission on Human Rights have catalogued Iraq’s violent treatment of suspected opponents of Saddam Hussein’s regime, including amputation.

Lieutenant General John Abizaid, the deputy commander of the allied forces, described video footage of the captured American troops broadcast on the Al Jazeera network as “disgusting.” The footage also showed bodies of at least four other soldiers, two of whom appeared to have been shot in the head, suspiciously like executions.