WASHINGTON, Aug 23 (AFP) - A Defense Department commission investigating abuses at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq has found top US commanders responsible for disorganization in the command structure that led to wrongdoing, NBC News reported Monday.
Citing obtained excerpts of the commissions report due to be unveiled Tuesday, the network said the panel headed by former Defense Secretary James Schlesinger found no evidence that units up the chain of command -- from the military police and intelligence brigades that operated in the prison -- were directly involved in the incidents.
But the report will accuse the Joint Chiefs of Staff of failing to recognize deteriorating mission performance among military intelligence interrogators owing to the stress of repeated combat deployments, the report said.
The commission also found there were not enough trained military police assigned to an increasingly growing detainee population because reinforcements were not sent to the prison despite a growing insurgency, NBC News said.
Seven US soldiers who worked as guards at Abu Ghraib have been charged with physical abuse and sexual humiliation of Iraqis.
The Schlesinger commission concluded that Brigadier General Janis Karpinski, commander of the police brigade, and Colonel Thomas Pappas, commander of the military intelligence brigade, knew or should have known of the abuses and should have taken measures to prevent them, the network said.