Abu Ghraib guard 'whistled, sang and laughed' during abuse

A Syrian inmate at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq testified in a videotape played for a US jury that Army Specialist Charles Graner merrily whistled, sang and laughed while brutalising him and forced him to eat pork and drink alcohol, against his Muslim faith.

Amin al-Sheikh, in video evidence to Graner’s court martial at Fort Hood, Texas, said the soldier threatened more than once to kill him and told him to thank Jesus for keeping him alive. The inmate also said he listened through his cell wall as Graner and other Americans forced a Yemeni prisoner to eat from a toilet.

Asked if Graner appeared to enjoy hurting him, al-Sheikh said through an interpreter: “He was laughing… He laughed. He was whistling. He was singing.”

He described Graner as the “primary torturer” and “a naturally aggressive man” – a characterisation that led Graner, sitting in the courtroom, to roll his eyes and chuckle.

Graner is the first soldier accused in the Abu Ghraib scandal to go on trial. Prosecutors allege the Army reservist was the ringleader of the abuse. Three fellow guards from the 372nd Military Police Company have pleaded guilty to abusing detainees at the prison 20 miles from Baghdad.

Graner is charged with conspiracy, assault, committing indecent acts and other offences. He could be sentenced to 17 and a half years in a military prison if convicted.

Al-Sheikh said he went to Iraq in 2003 to fight US-led forces, and he was taken to Abu Ghraib after being captured with AK-47 assault rifles, grenades and bomb-making material. While being kept at a tent camp next to Abu Ghraib, al-Sheikh said, he was wounded in the leg and chest in a shoot-out with Americans after he obtained a handgun from an Iraqi guard.

Al-Sheikh said Graner jumped on his wounded leg and struck it with a collapsible stick. On another occasion, he said, Graner handcuffed him to his cell door with his arms behind his back for eight hours.

Graner also accompanied a US soldier who urinated on him, al-Sheikh said. Another American threatened to rape him, he said.

Graner said after the video testimony that he remembered al-Sheikh.

“The last time I saw him, he was threatening to kill me,” the defendant said.

Under defence questioning, al-Sheikh said Graner at times worked with Americans who were interrogating him at Abu Ghraib. He said interrogators known as “Steve” and “Mikey” made it clear that he would be roughed up by Graner if he did not co-operate.

Defence lawyer Guy Womack said al-Sheikh’s testimony was good for his client.

“It was the face of the enemy,” Womack said. “It’s very clear that he hates America.”

The defence maintains that Graner and other soldiers were ordered by military and civilian intelligence officers to soften-up detainees for questioning, and that they had no choice but to obey.

Al-Sheikh admitted that he did not see Graner and others making the Yemeni prisoner eat from the toilet, but said it was clear that was happening from what he heard.