The Hindu : International : Probe will not restore honour, says former prisoner

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, May 08, 2004

International

International

Probe will not restore honour, says former prisoner

BAGHDAD, MAY 7. Haider Sabbar Abed points at the picture showing a naked prisoner, posed for the camera with his head hooded, his hands behind his head. ``That's me,'' Mr. Abed says.

Mr. Abed was one of a group of seven Iraqi prisoners now at the centre of the storm over the abuse of detenus by U.S. guards at Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison. The abuse allegation has exploded from an investigation into guards into wider review, anger at the U.S. Congress and promises that justice will be served by the U.S. President, George W Bush. But Mr. Abed (36) — looking at the photos now seen around the world — said today all the investigations would not do anything for him. ``Will any of this restore my honour to me? My dignity has been crushed under foot,'' he told The Associated Press. ``Bush says they (the guards) will be punished, but who knows? In all seriousness, do you really think they will?''

In pictures first made public by The Washington Post and New Yorker magazine, prisoners are shown stripped naked as guards taunt them and force them into humiliating poses. The prisoners' heads are hooded, but Mr. Abed said he recognised scars and tattoos on his body in the pictures. ``My mind is drenched with the memory of this. Every pose and position,'' he said.

Mr. Abed, a Shia from the southern city of Nasiriyah, was detained in July during a visit to Baghdad to get some paperwork from his time in the military under Saddam Hussein. He said a car that was giving him a ride was stopped by U.S. troops because it was of a make often used in anti-U.S. attacks.

— AP

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