Order issued to stop abuse of Iraqi prisoners

Lieutenant-Colonel Nicholas Mercer, an army legal expert, issued the order five days after he "heard of problems" connected with Operation Ali Baba, which is at the heart of the British abuse scandal, the hearing in Osnabrck, Germany, was told.

"Once we moved into an occupation role from a battlefield one the situation changed and numbers of allegations were made that Iraqis were not being treated as properly as they should be," he said.

Lt-Col Mercer, whose duties included issuing soldiers with an "idiot’s guide" about how to behave respectfully to civilians, issued an order five days after the incidents at Camp Bread Basket that "detainees should not be abused".

Three soldiers are on trial accused of degrading and humiliating suspected looters, making them simulate sex acts for the camera as well as tying them up and simulating beatings of them. They claim they were obeying the orders of a senior officer, Major Dan Taylor, to "work" the captured Iraqis "hard" - and that they missed out on the briefings that Lt-Col Mercer was in charge of giving.

The court martial, being held at the Roberts Barracks in the army garrison town, has already heard that Maj Taylor’s order was illegal both under army rules and those of the Geneva Convention governing the treatment of civilians in wartime.

Lance Corporal Darren Larkin, 30, L-Cpl Mark Cooley, 25, and Corporal Daniel Kenyon, 33, deny a total of eight charges breaching army discipline and good conduct laws. Larkin has admitted one count of assault on a captive - for which his lawyer said he was "deeply ashamed".

Twenty-two colour pictures from five cameras detail the incidents which took place on 15 May, 2003 and the soldiers face up to ten years in jail if convicted by the panel of seven officers trying them.

Lt-Col Mercer told the hearing that the looting after the war was "psychotic and epidemic" and said the Iraqis moved like locusts through entire buildings, stripping everything from them including light fittings and electrical wiring.

In his evidence yesterday, Lt-Col Mercer said soldiers were taught to report any abuse they witnessed.

He said even if the defendants missed reading a "soldier’s card" telling troops to behave with "dignity and humanity" they attended a rules-of-war conference each year informing them of how to conduct themselves on duty.

"What we say is that you should have moral courage and when you see something that is wrong, you should report it and it is taught from the outset," he said, adding that his orders had made it clear how detainees should be treated.

He said: "It is very clear, you simply detained them, handed them to the Royal Military Police with humanity and dignity. Once you distil it down it is very straightforward."

At one stage the lawyer for Cpl Kenyon tried to get him to say that some of the pictures taken at the time of the alleged abuse were for ID purposes only.

The judge advocate, Michael Hunter, interrupted, saying: "We are agreed that this is not a photographic record taken for the purposes of identification."

Earlier Cpl Kenyon’s lawyer, Joseph Giret, tried to paint a picture of his client as a brave man with a blemish-free record.

"He has been described as a war hero and he was responsible for saving the lives of several of his colleagues," he said.

The judge cut Mr Giret short, saying character references about his client could be made at a later date.

Mr Giret also argued that Kenyon was following orders given by a superior officer. He said: "He has not acted out of character. The whole reason he is in the dock stems from those who gave the order to operate the plan Ali Baba."

The Operation Ali Baba order - a reference to the story Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves - was given by Maj Taylor, and Mr Giret told the hearing that no soldier would ever refuse to carry out an order.

He said: "Any rank and file non-commissioned officer or commissioned soldier, officer class, would think very carefully about his or her position before they refused an order because it is not permitted in the army to refuse to carry out an order."

Opening the prosecution case against the soldiers, Lt Colonel Nick Clapham had described the abuse shown in the photographs as "shocking and appalling". He said: "The order to ‘work’ by Maj Taylor was an unlawful one but, even though the order was unlawful, had the defendants done no more they would not face the charges they face today."

The court heard that Maj Taylor had outlined the Operation Ali Baba plan to his commanding officer, Lt-Colonel David Paterson, who approved it. More than 100 British soldiers were involved.

A number of looters were captured during the operation and forced to carry back the aid they had stolen, the court heard.

The case continues.

HEADLINES AROUND THE WORLD

INTERNATIONAL reaction to the photographs was mixed yesterday, with the story making front pages across Europe while being largely ignored in the United States.

Much of the Arab media decried the pictures as shameful although they failed to provoke the level of outrage caused by the abuse at Abu Ghraib.

In Peru La Repblica filled its front page with one of the images under the headline "The inhuman condition" and with the caption "British troops demonstrate their idea of ‘fair play’ in Iraq".

Most daily Spanish newspapers published at least two of the photographs. El Pais said the ghost of Abu Ghraib haunted the British Army.

The photographs were front-page news in France too, where Le Monde led with the story.

"A new torture scandal [with] British heroes," read a headline on the front of the pan-Arab daily al-Hayat, under a photo of a soldier kicking a curled-up prisoner.

Al-Quds al-Arabi, a London-based pan-Arab daily, led with a story headlined "Scandalous picture revealing British soldiers torturing Iraqi prisoners".

The editor of Arab News, an English language daily in Saudi Arabia, said he had suppressed the story because millions of Muslims from around the world were in the Kingdom for the Hajj and he did not want to inflame passions.

In Iraq, the photos were shown on satellite television channels and Arab news websites, some of them known for publicising pro-insurgent viewpoints.

In the US, neither the Washington Post nor the New York Times carried the story yesterday, although the Post did publish a report of the photographs on its website, headlined "‘Britain’s Abu Ghraib’ photos hurt Blair".