Iraqi minister plays down torture reports

IRAQ'S Shi'ite interior minister accused critics yesterday of exaggerating reports of torture at a lock-up seized by US troops last weekend.

He also said that inmates included both Shi'ites and Sunnis and only a handful showed signs of abuse.

Interior Minister Bayn Jabr suggested some making the torture allegations were supporting the insurgency or had a personal score to settle and were using the US Embassy to exert pressure on him. He also said the interior ministry facility in the capital's Jadriyah district had held "dangerous terrorists", including one man accused of building six car bombs, he said.

One prisoner who was suffering from polio was a Shi'ite hired by Sunni religious extremists to detonate a roadside bomb, he said.

Mr Jabr appeared with senior commanders to try to defuse a crisis that grew on Tuesday after Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, under pressure from the Americans, announced that 173 detainees had been found by US soldiers at the Jadriyah facility. Some appeared malnourished and showed signs of torture, he said.

Most of the detainees were believed to be Sunni Arabs, prompting Sunni politicians to demand an international investigation. Sunni leaders, who have long complained of sectarian abuse by Shi'ite-led security forces, accused the government of trying to intimidate them from voting in the December 15 parliamentary election.

Shi'ites and Kurds dominate the government's security services, while most of the insurgents are Sunni Arabs.

Mr Jabr said only seven detainees showed signs of abuse "and the people behind the beatings will be punished according to the law." He also said the group included Shi'ites as well as Sunnis, although he gave no breakdown.

"I reject torture and I will punish those who perform torture," Mr Jabr said. "No-one was beheaded, no-one was killed."

Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch, a senior US military officer in Iraq, told reporters that US troops, led by Brig. Gen. Karl Horst, went to the facility because a 15-year-old boy was believed to be held there illegally.

Interior ministry officers denied the US troops entrance until Mr Horst made a phone call to Mr Jabr, who ordered the officers to allow the general and his men inside, Mr Lynch said.

"When he entered the facility, Gen. Horst saw 169 individuals that had been detained. Some of those individuals looked like they had been abused, malnourished and mistreated," Mr Lynch said. "Gen. Horst and his soldiers took control of the facility, took appropriate actions with the Iraqi leadership and the Iraqi government."

The spokesperson for a Sunni clerical association disputed Mr Jabr's claims, telling reporters that his group would not trust the findings of any investigation in which the Iraqi government played a role.

"We are not accusing anybody, but our people are being arrested by [interior ministry units] and then their bodies are found," Abdul-Salam al-Kubais of the Association of Muslim Scholars said.