WASHINGTON, Dec 21 (AFP) - New claims that prisoners held at a US base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, were abused while in custody need to be investigated, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said Tuesday.
McClellan's comments came after the largest US civil liberties group released documents showing fresh claims of abuse of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, including an FBI e-mail that described Defense Department interrogation techniques as "torture."
"The president expects that if there are allegations of abuse, that those allegations need to be taken seriously," McClellan said.
"They need to be fully investigated. People need to be held accountable and brought to justice if they're involved in wrongdoing, and that preventive measures and corrective measures are put in place to prevent it from happening again."
The American Civil Liberties Union also released one document that suggested President George W. Bush had issued an executive order allowing inhuman interrogation methods against detainees in Iraq -- a claim McClellan denied.
McClellan insisted there is "no executive order relating to interrogation techniques. When it comes to military detainees and interrogation methods, those are determinations made by the Department of Defense."
However the ACLU released copies of a two-page e-mail message dated May 22 that refers repeatedly to an executive order signed by Bush which, according to an ACLU statement, "states that the president directly authorized interrogation techniques including sleep deprivation, stress positions, the use of military dogs, and 'sensory deprivation through the use of hoods, etc.'."
The Federal Bureau of Investigation e-mail was sent to a handful of senior FBI officials from "On Scene Commander--Baghdad." It states the FBI has prohibited its agents from employing the techniques that Bush allegedly authorized.
The documents were obtained after the ACLU and other groups filed a lawsuit against the government for failing to respond to a Freedom of Information Act request.
Other documents the ACLU made public include:
- A heavily redacted June 2004 "Urgent Report" addressed to FBI Director Robert Mueller mentions that an FBI agent "observed numerous physical abuse incidents of Iraqi civilian detainees," including "strangulation, beatings, (and) placement of lit cigarettes into the detainees ear openings."
The document states that "(redacted) was providing this account to the FBI based on his knowledge that (redacted) were engaged in a cover-up of these abuses."
- An August 2 e-mail from another FBI agent that witnessed Guantanamo detainees under interrogation who were shackled hand and foot in a fetal position on the floor for 18 to 24 hours at a time, and most had "urinated or defacated (sic)" on themselves.
One detainee was held in an unventilated room at a temperature "probably well over a hundred degrees (Farenheit)" (38 Celsius).
"The detainee was almost unconscious on the floor, with a pile of hair next to him. He had apparently been literally pulling his own hair out throughout the night," the agent wrote.
- A July 30 FBI agent's account of an interrogation at Guantanamo "apparently conducted by Defense Department personnel -- in which a detainee was wrapped in an Israeli flag and bombarded with loud music and strobe lights."
The documents "raise grave questions about where the blame for widespread detainee abuse ultimately rests," said ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero.
"Top government officials can no longer hide from public scrutiny by pointing the finger at a few low-ranking soldiers," he added.
The FBI e-mail "is not proof of a presidential order to commit unlawful acts, but it strongly suggests that US interrogators thought they were acting with the president's approval," said Human Rights Watch executive director Kenneth Roth.
"It's no longer enough for Bush to issue a simple denial. A real explanation is needed," he said.
The various interrogation methods described in the documents the ACLU obtained are violations of US obligations under international law, Roth said.
The documents can be seen at http://www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/fbi.html.
12/21/2004 22:32 GMT - AFP