No public probe into Iraq ‘abuse’

originally published:
14th November 2009

Fresh allegations of abuse by the UK military in Iraq do not warrant a new public inquiry, the Armed Forces Minister Bill Rammell has said.

He told the BBC the claims were taken seriously and would be investigated but that allegations did not mean facts. He said a special unit within the Ministry of Defence, overseen by him, had been set up to examine the claims.

Lawyers for former Iraqi detainees want an inquiry into 33 abuse claims, which include the rape of a 16-year-old boy. Mr Rammell said there should not be a wider public inquiry because each case first had to be examined and disciplinary action taken if there was evidence of wrongdoing.

He said: “There is no credible evidence that endemic abuse was a coherent part of the way our military operated. “The “vast, vast majority” of the 120,000 British soldiers who had served in Iraq had adhered to “the highest standards of behaviour,” he added.

Earlier, Mr Rammell told the BBC seven of the allegations had come in within the last month, and the rest date back “significantly beyond that period”.

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Posted by Kushi Amlak-Sakhu on 14/11/2009. Filed under Breaking News & Digests,State Terror. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry