Iraqi officials investigating claims Sunnis were abused in makeshift prison

Iraq investigating claims of Sunni abuse in prison

BAGHDAD — Iraqi officials are investigating claims that detainees, believed to be mostly Sunnis, were tortured at a makeshift prison in Baghdad, in a case that has outraged the country’s Sunni minority, Iraqi officials said Thursday.

The deputy human rights minister, Kamil Amin, said that three army officers have been arrested in connection with the case. An Iraqi who said he was in the prison described being beaten, tortured with electric shock treatment and smothered with a plastic bag.

The case, which was first reported Monday by the Los Angeles Times, has angered the country’s Sunni population who see it as another example of persecution by Iraq’s Shiite-led government.

The charges come at a delicate time, as the country waits to see who will take the lead in forming the next government: a coalition with extensive Sunni support, or a Shiite-dominated bloc led by the current prime minister.

The incident also raises chilling comparisons with the revelation in 2005 of a secret prison run by the Shiite-dominated security forces in Baghdad where Sunnis were tortured.

In the ensuing years of sectarian battles in the capital, Sunnis repeatedly accused security forces of actively aiding, or at least turning a blind eye to Shiite death squads.

At least 431 Iraqi men from the northern province of Ninevah were arrested last year and taken to a Ministry of Defense facility in Baghdad, said Amin. The Human Rights Ministry became involved after hearing complaints from family members of detainees saying they were tortured.

A former prisoner, Radhwan Shihab Ahmed Salih al-Abadi, told The Associated Press in a telephone interview Thursday that he was arrested in December and taken to the prison where he was treated in a “barbaric way.”

“They used to asphyxiate us with plastic bags until we were about to fall unconscious and then open the bag,” he said. “They were also using electric shocks during investigation.”

Al-Abadi said he was arrested along with his brother who was accused of being part of the insurgency and is still being held. His claims could not be immediately verified.

An army officer who worked at the prison said it was a military barracks that was converted into a detention facility last fall to hold the prisoners from Ninevah province, and that it has since been closed. During a visit by an Associated Press reporter Thursday, the facility was empty. The officer did not want to be identified due to the sensitivity of the issue.

The buildings where the prisoners were held was part of a row of barracks on an Iraqi army base at the city’s Muthanna airport, hidden from the nearby main road by two rows of concrete blast walls.

The buildings themselves were encircled by further blast walls topped with concertina wire, while the windows bricked up from the inside.

It was unclear exactly how much oversight there was of the facility although Amin said prisoners had access to judges and their families.

U.S. military and embassy officials visited the prison Wednesday, said an embassy spokesman, Armand Cucciniello.

“What is alleged is disturbing. We have raised with senior Iraqi government officials our concerns regarding its existence and allegations of the abuse of detainees there, and urged the Iraqi government to conduct an investigation,” he said.

Amin said the Minister of Human Rights visited the prison in March after hearing the complaints and talked with prisoners there who alleged they were subjected to torture. The minister submitted complaints to the Ministry of Justice and the prime minister’s office.

A senior adviser to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said the prime minister knew nothing about the torture allegations until it was brought to him by the ministry.

“The government will hold accountable all officials in the security forces who have proven to be involved in this or have violated the rights of the prisoners,” said Sadiq Rikabi.

About 100 of the prisoners have already been released and the rest were transferred to another prison in Baghdad and the Justice Ministry is reviewing their cases, Amin said.

A senior official with the Ministry of Defense’s intelligence department said the prisoners were transferred from Ninevah province to Baghdad after judges in Mosul, the capital of Ninevah, complained they were receiving threats and were not able to do their jobs properly. The official did not want to be identified because he was not authorized to speak to the media on the issue.

Meanwhile, Maj. Gen. Qassim al-Moussawi in a news conference Thursday described how the arrest of militant Munaf Abdul-Rahim al-Rawi led investigators to the two top-ranking al-Qaida figures killed over the weekend.

U.S. officials have said that the deaths of Abu Omar al-Baghdadi and Abu Ayyub al-Masri were devastating blows to al-Qaida in Iraq.

Al-Rawi played a role in a number of attacks including the bombings of several government ministries last year, said al-Moussawi, although he gave no further details.

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Associated Press writers Hamid Ahmed and Rebecca Santana contributed to this report.