Iraqis unmoved by Bush's TV offensive

Senior US administration and military officials also lined up to apologise publicly for the mistreatment of prisoners inside Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad.

Mr Bush told a sceptical Arab world that the actions of soldiers who abused Iraqi prisoners "don’t represent America" and pledged that "justice will be served".

Speaking on the US-funded al-Hurra channel, he said: "In a democracy, everything is not perfect. Mistakes are made. But in a democracy, as well, those mistakes will be investigated and people will be brought to justice.

"It’s a matter that reflects badly on my country. Our citizens in America are appalled by what they saw, just like people in the Middle East are appalled."

Mr Bush also spoke to the Dubai-based al-Arabiya network. The channel, popular throughout the Arab world, first aired most of his performance unedited in English with no subtitles before later airing the full interview dubbed into Arabic.

Al-Hurra is a US government-funded Arabic-language station largely seen as propaganda. The president notably skipped the popular Qatar-based al-Jazeera network, which the US has accused of lying about the situation in Iraq to inflame viewers.

Both al-Jazeera and al- Arabiya have received harsh words from US officials, but the better-established al-Jazeera has taken the brunt of the criticism.

A week after photographs were published of grinning soldiers abusing naked Iraqis at a prison once used by Saddam Hussein’s torturers, the US army revealed 25 prisoners have died in Iraq and Afghanistan in custody, including two Iraqi prisoners murdered by Americans and one ruled a justifiable homicide. Twelve of the prisoners were found to have died by natural or undetermined causes and ten are still being investigated.

The CIA also said yesterday it was investigating the deaths of three prisoners who were interrogated by agency personnel in Iraq and Afghanistan, but it did not say if these three deaths were among the 25 already revealed by the army.

Two top Bush allies on Capitol Hill, the Senate majority leader, Bill Frist, a Tennessee Republican, and the Senate armed-services committee chairman John Warner, of Virginia, said they were appalled by the prisoner abuse.

Donald Rumsfeld, the defence secretary, who knew about abuse allegations in January, was asked to testify at a Senate armed-services committee hearing tentatively set for today.

Last week’s images sparked worldwide outrage and a hasty damage-control exercise in Washington.

At the Abu Ghraib prison, outside Baghdad, hundreds marched outside the heavily guarded walls demanding the release of relatives. Some vowed vengeance. Nearly 4,000 Iraqis are being held at the prison.

At a coffee shop in Baghdad, where men gathered to watch Mr Bush on television, Abdul-Kader Abdul-Rahim, a customer, said he did not doubt that the US military would investigate the abuse, but he doubted this would change conditions in Iraq. "I do believe the president when he talks about investigation because they live in a democracy and in this democracy even Bush can be investigated," he said. "But what is happening in Iraq is different from their democratic regimes. We’re all treated like prisoners here."

A US general’s probe into mistreatment at the prison recounted detainees being sexually assaulted, beaten and kept naked for days.

US officials in Iraq have rejected comparisons with Saddam’s old regime, which killed and tortured thousands in Abu Ghraib. "We didn’t put 300,000 in mass graves," said one.

The general brought in from Guantnamo Bay to run the jails in the wake of the report apologised and vowed there would be no repeat of abuse, saying beatings, hooding and other practices were banned.

About 10,000 Iraqis still held would be freed, Major General Geoffrey Miller added.

Condoleezza Rice, the US national security adviser, also apologised, saying: "We are deeply sorry for what has happened to these people."

In his broadcast yesterday, Mr Bush said the people of Iraq "must understand that what took place in that prison does not represent the America that I know".

He added: "The America I know is a compassionate country that believes in freedom. The America I know cares about every individual.

"The America I know has sent troops into Iraq to promote freedom, good honourable citizens that are helping Iraqis everyday."

The president, who is seeking re-election in November, also rejected the comparison with the Iraqi regime before the invasion last year.

"This completely contradicts with life under the Saddam Hussein regime. His trained torturers were never tried.

There were no investiga- tions about mistreatment of people. In our case, there will be an investigation and people will be brought to justice," he said.

But efforts to portray the cases captured on camera as a few bad apples ring hollow to many Iraqis, for whom tales of beatings and humiliation behind the razor wire have been commonplace since the US-led invasion toppled Saddam a year ago.

After watching the broadcast yesterday, Abdel Gawad Ahmed, a lawyer in Cairo, said: "The apology will not change anything.

"It does not hold. Is it an apology for the victims we see every day? Or for violating international conventions?"

Sami Ibrahim, 24, an Egyptian real estate agent, said he wasn’t interested in Mr Bush’s explanations: "I won’t believe what he says. I don’t trust their intentions anyway."

In Baghdad, Sari Mouwaffaq, a mechanic, said: "Bush’s statements will not restore the dignity which the tortured detainees have lost.

"Bush’s apology, or his attempt to find excuses, has no value to us."