US army doctors involved in Abu Ghraib abuse says report

10.30am

WASHINGTON - US military doctors working in Iraq collaborated with interrogators in the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison outside Baghdad, an article in the British medical journal The Lancet said on Friday.

A US military spokesman said the article was inaccurate, and a spokesman for an American physicians group said that if the accusations are true, the doctors and other medical personnel should stand trial.

The Lancet report by University of Minnesota professor Steven Miles suggested that some doctors falsified death certificates to cover up killings and hid evidence of beatings, and one detainee who collapsed after a beating was revived by medics so that the abuse could continue.

"Army officials stated that a physician and a psychiatrist helped design, approve and monitor interrogations at Abu Ghraib," Miles wrote, citing US congressional hearings, sworn statements of detainees and soldiers, medical journal accounts and aid agency information.

The Pentagon denied Miles' report.

"The Department of Defence takes strong exception to these allegations and (Miles') wholesale indictment of the medical care rendered by US personnel to prisoners and detainees," Army Lt. Col. Joe Richard said in response to questions.

Richard said the Lancet article was inaccurate and based on "carefully selected media reports and excerpted (Capitol) Hill testimony and not first-hand investigative work or accounts."

He added that investigations were under way into prison operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and if any transgressions of the Geneva Conventions or US military regulations occurred, those responsible would be held accountable.

'THEY SHOULD BE SUBJECT TO TRIAL'

"If the facts are as they have been reported, with physicians and medics participating essentially in torture of prisoners ... these are the kinds of abuses that we properly prosecuted and associate, I'm sorry to say, with the actions of medical personnel during the Third Reich," said Robert Musil of the group Physicians for Social Responsibility.

"If there are physicians, medics who are engaged in this sort of thing, then they should be subject to trial and court martial," Musil said by telephone. "Then the facts would be brought out in a military court."

The American Medical Association, when asked for comment on the report, said it supported a World Medical Association statement denouncing any physician participation in torture "for any reason."

Defence officials told Reuters a report to be sent to Congress next week suggests some medical personnel at Abu Ghraib did not initially report detainee injuries. The report will recommend punishment ranging from reprimands and loss of rank and pay to perhaps criminal trials for about two dozen intelligence soldiers and other personnel, the officials said.

The report, a US Army investigation into participation by military intelligence troops in the abuses at Abu Ghraib, will criticise senior military commanders for a lack of professionalism and discipline but will note they did not order the abuse.

Seven national guard military police have already been charged in connection with the scandal.

- REUTERS

Herald Feature: Iraq