Graphic newspaper pictures that purported to show British soldiers threatening and urinating on an Iraqi prisoner were "categorically not taken in Iraq," the government said Thursday.
The Daily Mirror slapped back with a defiant statement saying officials had not proven the images were faked, and insisted the photos "accurately illustrated the reality about the appalling conduct of some British troops."
Armed Forces Minister Adam Ingram's assertion directly contradicted the Daily Mirror's claim that the pictures showed a hooded detainee being beaten near the southern city of Basra.
He stopped short of declaring the photographs fake, but other lawmakers responding to his comments in the House of Commons said they were. Some called for Piers Morgan, the paper's outspoken editor, to go.
Ingram said Royal Military Police investigators' conclusion that the photos were not taken in Iraq had been "independently corroborated" and warned that those who produced the pictures may have broken military law.
"We had to treat these photos at face value," he said.
"That value has changed. Investigations are now proceeding on this basis: These pictures were categorically not taken in Iraq.
"The truck in which the photos were taken was never in Iraq," he said.
General Mike Jackson, the British army's top officer, said Thursday night that he was "relieved" the photos were apparently fakes. But he said investigations into allegations of abuse of Iraqi prisoners by British forces would continue.
Prime Minister Tony Blair told the House of Commons on Wednesday that the photos "were almost certainly fake."
Morgan said in a statement that Ingram "has still not produced incontrovertible evidence that the pictures are faked."
"But these photographs were just one piece of evidence about one incident," Morgan said.
"There is, of course, a much bigger issue here that we make no apology for highlighting -- which is that the pictures accurately illustrated the reality about the appalling conduct of some British troops," he said.
Ingram said he could not disclose details of the evidence while the investigation continued.
The pictures -- which included images purporting to show a soldier pressing the butt of a gun against a prisoner's groin and pointing a rifle at his head -- were published just after those showing US troops abusing prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad.
They thrust the possibility of similar behavior by British forces onto front pages here. Ingram said investigators were continuing to examine such allegations.
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