Rumsfeld swoops into Baghdad, addresses abuse row

US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld flew in to Baghdad on Thursday on a surprise visit as the United States struggles to quell outrage over the torture of prisoners that is sapping its credibility in Iraq.

Hours after US lawmakers viewed "sadistic" new photographs of US troops torturing Iraqis, the embattled secretary and Washington's top general arrived at Baghdad Airport. It was not clear if he would visit the nearby Abu Ghraib prison itself.

General Richard Myers, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff: "We absolutely have the high moral ground" in Iraq.

Once notorious as Saddam Hussein's torture chamber, the prison has become a symbol of the United States' failure to win over many Iraqis despite ridding them of Saddam a year ago. With just seven weeks to go until Washington hands sovereignty back to an Iraqi government, that is a serious problem for Rumsfeld.

He denied on the secret, 15-hour flight from Washington that the Pentagon was trying to cover up the scandal, which emerged when proceedings were opened in January against seven military police, who have now been charged, but exploded into a global issue with the release of soldiers' photographs two weeks ago.

"If anybody thinks that I'm (in Iraq) to throw water on a fire, they're wrong," Rumsfeld told reporters on board. "We care about the detainees being treated right. We care about soldiers behaving right. We are about command systems working."

Critics are calling for Rumsfeld, one of the architects of last year's invasion of Iraq, to resign.

Other US defence officials said the sudden trip by Rumsfeld and Myers was triggered by the photographs.

"This is a terrible tragedy. We're not going to ever say it's not," said Myers.

Efforts by President George W Bush's administration to contain the damage in a presidential election year to the seven soldiers charged have been buffeted by reports from the Red Cross and other independent bodies saying that Washington was warned about systematic and widespread torture months ago.

The Red Cross also found that 70 to 90 per cent of Iraqi prisoners had been innocent when detained.

Not only are Arabs dismayed at evidence that the troops who overthrew Saddam's dictatorship were inflicting torments themselves on thousands of Iraqis but US allies, many of whom opposed the war, are also becoming more vocal in criticism.

"It all gives the impression of a total lack of direction," French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier told Le Monde newspaper in unusually tough comments about Iraq under US occupation.

Prisoner abuses, the seizure of foreign hostages and persistent violence showed the country and region were spinning out of control, Barnier said.

In the holy cities of Najaf and Kerbala, where US troops are facing an uprising by a Shi'ite Muslim militia loyal to radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, there was renewed fighting.

Sadr's Mehdi Army fighters stormed the main police station in Najaf overnight, held the police chief hostage and emptied the weapons store, police said.

They made off with three police vehicles when US tanks arrived at the station, about 1.5km from the shrines of Najaf, some of the holiest in the Shi'ite world.

US commanders say they do not intend to penetrate the most sacred part of the city, but the overnight operation appeared to be the deepest they have advanced from the bases on the outskirts they occupied earlier this month.

Officials at the main city hospital said two dead bodies and six wounded people had been brought in.

In nearby Kerbala, gunfire echoed from narrow streets just a few hundred metres (yards) from the revered Imam Hussein mosque in early afternoon. Smoke rose nearby, witnesses said.

A Reuters cameraman at the scene said militiamen had attacked a US Abrams tank with rocket-propelled grenades and damaged it. There was no immediate confirmation from US commanders. The clashes followed a lull in fighting for several hours.

US forces and the Mehdi Army, have skirmished repeatedly in recent days in several Shi'ite cities across southern Iraq.

The US military has pledged to destroy the Mehdi Army, a force estimated to be around 5,000 strong and formed in the last year. Despite its far greater strength, US forces have found it difficult to tackle the militia, with fighters hiding out in back alleys and inside religious buildings.

Members of the US Congress saw new images of violence and sexual humiliation from Abu Ghraib in a closed viewing one lawmaker likened to a descent into "the wings of hell."

Lawmakers said images showed inmates apparently being coerced to commit sodomy, wounds possibly from dog bites, a number of dead bodies, and examples of "sadistic torture".

Some top Republicans urged them to be kept under wraps, saying they could endanger US forces overseas. American civilian Nick Berg was beheaded, apparently by an al Qaeda group in Iraq, this month in what they said was a reprisal for abuses.

"When you think of the sadism, the violence, the sexual humiliation, after a while you just turn away, you just can't take it any more," said Senator Richard Durbin, an opposition Democrat. "I still cannot believe that this happened without the knowledge of those at higher levels."

- REUTERS

Herald Feature: Iraq