There are fears that Iraqi police have been infiltrated by Shia Muslim paramilitaries -- in particular the Iranian-backed Badr Brigades -- who have targeted Iraq's minority Sunni community.
Seif Saad, an Iraqi guard, showed no remorse on Wednesday for the detention and alleged abuse of 173 prisoners in Baghdad.
"We placed sacks on their heads and tied their hands behind their backs," he said of their arrests, but, as far as he was concerned, they were suspected terrorists.
He was standing in a watchtower overlooking the ministry of the interior building where the detainees were held. The cells were found at the weekend by US forces and the discovery of the prisoners -- and the allegations of torture -- have provoked an international outcry.
The Iraqi police force is now subject to intense scrutiny. The main charge is that the police have been infiltrated by Shia Muslim paramilitaries -- in particular the Iranian-backed Badr Brigades -- who have targeted Iraq's minority Sunni community, from which the insurgency arose.
Since a new Iraqi government was established in the spring, several accounts have emerged of arrests, abuse and extrajudicial killings by paramilitary forces linked to the ministry and dominated by Shia Muslims operating in squads with names such as the Scorpions and the Wolf Brigade. Almost all the incidents have had a sectarian edge.
Saad, 18, a former laborer with no police training, denied the arrests were religiously motivated. He told a reporter the suspects had been brought in for questioning in connection with bombings, regardless of whether they were Sunni, Shia or Kurd. The reporter said Saad wore a special forces uniform resembling that of a Shia paramilitary group.
US forces said they had been hunting for a missing youth when they uncovered the secret detention center. The Iraqi government has launched an inquiry and promised an answer within a week.
But Manfred Novak, the UN special envoy on torture, yesterday called for an independent inquiry. He has received various allegations of torture and degrading treatment by both US and Iraqi forces in Iraq.
Stephen Bowen, an Amnesty International UK campaigns director, said: "This is by no means the first time that we've encountered cases of detainees apparently being tortured by members of the interior ministry -- a grisly pattern is emerging."
Ayad al-Samarrai, a senior official with the Iraqi Islamic party, a mainstream Sunni group, said his organization had made complaints about the illegal arrest and abuse of Sunni Muslims by government paramilitary forces for six months.
The party wanted an independent Iraqi inquiry established, with support from the US military and perhaps the UN, but with the powers to enter interior ministry buildings to investigate the widely reported accounts of abuse and torture. If no suitable Iraqi inquiry team could be set up, then an international investigation should be set up, he said. He said officials from Iraq's human rights ministry had tried to investigate but had been refused access by the powerful interior ministry.
South Korea’s air force yesterday apologized for a 2021 midair collision involving two fighter jets, a day after auditors said the pilots were taking selfies and filming during the flight and held them responsible for the accident. “We sincerely apologize to the public for the concern caused by the accident that occurred in 2021,” an air force spokesman told a news conference, adding that one of the pilots involved had been suspended from flying duties, received severe disciplinary action and has since left the military. The apology followed a report released on Wednesday by the South Korean Board of Audit and Inspection,
Indonesian police have arrested 13 people after shocking images of alleged abuse against small children at a daycare center went viral, sparking outrage across the nation, officials said on Monday. Police on Friday last week raided Little Aresha, a daycare center in Yogyakarta on Java island, following a report from a former employee. CCTV footage circulating on social media showed children, most younger than two, lying on the floor wearing only diapers, their hands and feet bound with rags. The police have confirmed that the footage is authentic. Police said they also found 20 children crammed into a room just 3m by 3m. “So
About 240 Indians claiming descent from a Biblical tribe landed at Tel Aviv airport on Thursday as part of a government operation to relocate them to Israel. The newcomers passed under a balloon arch in blue and white, the colors of the Israeli flag, as dozens of well-wishers welcomed them with a traditional Jewish song. They were the first “bnei Menashe” (“sons of Manasseh”) to arrive in Israel since the government in November last year announced funding for the immigration of about 6,000 members of the community from the states of Manipur and Mizoram in northeast India. The community claims to descend from
‘TROUBLING’: The firing of Phelan, who was an adviser to a nonprofit that supported the defense of Taiwan, was another example of ‘dysfunction’ under Trump, a US senator said US Secretary of the Navy John Phelan has been fired, a US official and a person familiar with the matter said on Wednesday, in another wartime shakeup at the Pentagon coming just weeks after US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth ousted the Army’s top general. The Pentagon announced his departure in a brief statement, saying he was leaving the administration “effective immediately,” but it did not provide a reason or say whether it was his decision to go. The sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Phelan was dismissed in part because he was moving too slowly to implement reforms to
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