WASHINGTON - Hundreds of unreleased photographs and short digital videos depict US soldiers using a wide variety of abusive techniques at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison and appearing to enjoy the mistreatment, the Washington Post has reported.
The paper said on Friday that the new pictures and videos amplify the picture of violence in the prison and go beyond the photos previously shown in the media.
Video clips broadcast in the United States and Britain showed a prisoner being struck across the face and another in handcuffs being dragged across the floor.
Photos and videos from Abu Ghraib were presented to Army investigators in January. The images began surfacing publicly last month, severely damaging the United States' reputation in the Arab world.
The Post said one video clip showed five hooded and naked detainees standing against the wall in the darkness, each masturbating, with two other hooded detainees crouched at their feet.
Another video segment showed a prisoner handcuffed to the outside of a cell door, slamming his head into the green metal, the newspaper said.
In one photo, a soldier is seen cocking his fist as he holds a hooded detainee in a headlock amid a pile of several detainees. Later he is seen kneeling atop the pile, flexing his muscles, a broad smile on his face, the newspaper said.
An image on the newspaper's website depicted a soldier wielding a baton as a naked detainee covered in a brown substance stood in a hallway with his arms outstretched and ankles cuffed together.
ABUSE INVESTIGATED
The newspaper said the new images did not shed light on who directed the abuse, which is the subject of several investigations.
Defence Department spokesman Lawrence DiRita told The Post the images sounded like those the Pentagon showed to members of the US Congress and that Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld had warned might become public.
A Pentagon spokesman was not immediately available for comment.
The Post also said it had obtained 13 previously secret sworn statements by detainees at the prison that further detailed abuse.
Many of the detainees described how they were sexually humiliated and assaulted, threatened with rape and forced to masturbate in front of female soldiers, according to the newspaper.
The statements added allegations of prisoners being ridden like animals and forced to retrieve their food from toilets, the newspaper said.
US lawmakers saw more than 1,600 images from the investigation of mistreatment of Iraqi detainees at Abu Ghraib.
Among the newly released photos is one showing a prisoner in an orange jumpsuit recoiling from a snarling dog.
In a description of some photos the Post said: "Hooded and cloaked men are handcuffed to hallway rails. A prisoner in flexible handcuffs is made to use a banana to simulate anal sex. Two naked male detainees are handcuffed to each other. A naked detainee hangs upside down from a top bunk."
US soldiers also turned the cameras on themselves, filming scenes of consensual sex, the Post said.
Reserve Brigadier General Janis Karpinski, who oversaw prison facilities in Iraq, told the CBS "Early Show" she was "as shocked as anybody else would be" at the new pictures.
Karpinski, who has said military intelligence was in charge of interrogations and not the military police under her command, said windows and doors in the cellblocks used for questioning at Abu Ghraib were blocked with panels.
- REUTERS