THE US/IRAQ: A "draft update" for the US Secretary of Defence, Mr Donald Rumsfeld, on interrogation rules in Iraq was omitted from a classified report on the prison abuse scandal submitted by the Pentagon to a Senate committee, US officials have confirmed, Conor O'Clery in New York reports
Also missing from the report on torture and humiliation at Abu Ghraib prison was a document written by Maj Gen Geoffrey Miller that apparently laid out aggressive interrogation tactics.
In further revelations pointing to official sanction of abusive techniques, NBC television yesterday published new photographs from inside Abu Ghraib showing army intelligence officers questioning naked and bound prisoners.
Previous photographs mainly showed guards abusing detainees.
The existence of the document tying Mr Rumsfeld to at least approving tougher techniques was revealed by the Wall Street Journal, which said Congress members had complained on Wednesday that a 6,000 page report on abuse by Maj Gen Antonio Taguba was delivered to the Senate Armed Services Committee with 2,000 pages missing. The pages concerning the Defence Secretary could have significance, as Mr Rumsfeld testified to Congress this month that Geneva Convention rules forbidding abuse and ill-treatment of prisoners were applied in Iraq.
Gen Miller was reassigned to Iraq last summer after spending 17 months as commander of operations at the US detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and recommended that army rules be changed to allow military police guards to create conditions for interrogation.
Also missing was key testimony from Col Thomas Pappas, the commander of military intelligence at Abu Ghraib, Congressional sources told NBC.
A spokesman for the Defence Department characterised the missing documents as insignificant, and said they would now be sent to the Armed Services Committee.
Seven guards have been court martialled in connection with the scandal and Brig Gen Janis Karpinski, who commanded the guards, has been suspended, but no intelligence officers have been charged.
On Wednesday former Vice President Al Gore demanded that Mr Rumsfeld and other top Bush administration officials resign for encouraging policies that led to the abuse.
The photographs obtained by NBC show the aggressive interrogation of three naked Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib by military intelligence officers. In one, a soldier is seen pressing his knee into the neck of one of the three naked prisoners huddled on the floor.
In another a military intelligence officer appears to have thrown an unidentified object at the prisoners. NBC suggested that the prisoners were being interrogated in connection with the shooting of a military police sergeant by a detainee.
In his report Gen Taguba blamed a failure of command at Abu Ghraib and said that guards should play no role in the interrogation of detainees. It was also reported yesterday that the sometimes brutal interrogation of Iraqi detainees at Abu Ghraib last year yielded very little valuable intelligence.
Quoting civilian and military officials, the New York Times said that the interrogation centre was set up in September as casualties among American soldiers rose due to a growing insurgency, and generals and Pentagon officials became unhappy with the flow of intelligence.
However, interrogators learned little about the insurgency from detainees, most of whom had nothing to do with the attacks on soldiers. A senior military intelligence officer said that most useful intelligence came from battlefield interrogations or at field interrogation facilities, and once prisoners were sent on to Abu Ghraib they got very little feedback.