[A-List] Iraq: US, British Savagery Discredits Humanity

Fri May 21 21:16:38 MDT 2004

1) Iraqi Detainee Statements Reveal Prison Savagery
2) More Prison Horrors Emerge
3) Disgusting Torture Images Pile Pressures On Bush
4) Nightmare Never Ends At US Iraqi Torture Dungeon
5) Iraqis Will Never Forgive Britain For Torture,
Killing, Mutilation
6) Southern Iraq: "I Have Not Killed But, God Willing,
I Soon Will"
7) Hundreds Of Thousands Of Shiites Rally Across
Mideast Against U.S. 
8) Pakistani Shias Protest Iraq Killings, Prisoner
Abuse
9) Four Iraqi Government Security Personnel Gunned
Down
10) Iran Condemns US Massacre In Iraqi Border Town

1)
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/05/21/1085120118037.html

The Age (Australia)
May 22, 2004

Detainee statements reveal prison savagery

-The detainees said they were savagely beaten and
repeatedly humiliated sexually by US soldiers working
on the night shift at Tier 1A in Abu Ghraib during the
holy month of Ramadan....
-Mr Hilas also said he witnessed an army translator
having sex with a youth at the prison. He said the
youth was between 15 and 18 years old. Someone hung
sheets to block the view, but Mr Hilas said he heard
screams and climbed a door to get a better look. "The
kid was hurting very bad." 
Another detainee told military investigators that US
soldiers sodomised and beat him.

Fresh details of violence and degradation by US prison
guards have come to light. Scott Higham and Joe
Stephens report from Washington.

Previously secret sworn statements by detainees at the
Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq describe in raw detail abuse
that goes well beyond what has been made public,
adding allegations of prisoners being ridden like
animals, sexually fondled by female soldiers and
forced to retrieve their food from toilets.

The statements - which provide the most detailed
picture yet of what took place in the jail - were
taken from 13 detainees soon after a soldier reported
the incidents to military investigators in mid-
January. 

The detainees said they were savagely beaten and
repeatedly humiliated sexually by US soldiers working
on the night shift at Tier 1A in Abu Ghraib during the
holy month of Ramadan, according to copies of the
statements obtained by The Washington Post. 

Some of the detainees described being abused as
punishment or discipline after they were caught
fighting or with a prohibited item. Some said they
were pressed to denounce Islam or were force-fed pork
and liquor. "They said we will make you wish to die
and it will not happen," said Ameen Saeed al-Sheik,
detainee No. 151362.

The sworn statements were taken in Baghdad between
January 16 and 21.

Kasim Mehaddi Hilas, detainee No. 151108, told
investigators that when he arrived at Abu Ghraib last
year, he was forced to strip, put on a hood and wear
rose-coloured panties with flowers on them. 

Mr Hilas also said he witnessed an army translator
having sex with a youth at the prison. He said the
youth was between 15 and 18 years old. Someone hung
sheets to block the view, but Mr Hilas said he heard
screams and climbed a door to get a better look. "The
kid was hurting very bad." 

Another detainee told military investigators that US
soldiers sodomised and beat him. The detainee, whose
name is being withheld by the Post because he is an
alleged victim of a sexual assault, said he was kept
naked for five days when he arrived at Abu Ghraib and
was forced to kneel for four hours wearing a hood. He
said he was beaten so badly one day that the hood flew
off his head.

One day, the detainee said, US soldiers held him down
and spread his legs as another soldier prepared to
pull down his zipper. "I started screaming," he said.
A soldier stepped on his head, he said, and someone
broke a phosphoric light and spilled the chemicals on
him. "I was glowing and they were laughing," he said. 

The detainee said the soldiers eventually brought him
to a room and sodomised him with a stick. "They were
taking pictures of me during all these instances," he
told investigators. 

Mr Hilas and another detainee said they saw Specialist
Charles Graner - identified by a number of detainees
as having abused them - and others sodomise a detainee
with a phosphoric light. 

Mohanded Juma Juma, detainee No. 152307, said
Specialist Graner repeatedly threw the detainees'
meals into the toilets and said, "Eat it."

Hussein Mohssein Mata al-Zayiadi, detainee No. 19446,
said soldiers forced him and others to crawl on their
hands and knees and were sometimes ridden by them like
animals.

Mr al-Zayiadi also described what has become one of
the iconic photographs in the prison abuse scandal.
"They brought my friends, Haidar, Ahmed, Nouri, Ahzem,
Hashiem, Mustafa, and I, and they put us two on the
bottom, two on top of them, and two on top of those
and one on top," he said. "They took pictures of us
and we were naked." 

Another publicised photograph - that of a hooded
detainee hooked up to wires and standing on a box - is
also described in the statements. 

"On the third day, after 5 o'clock, Mr Graner came and
took me to room Number 37, which is the shower room,
and he started punishing me," said Abdou Hussain Saad
Faleh, detainee No. 18170. "Then he brought a box of
food and he made me stand on it with no clothing,
except a blanket. Then a tall black soldier came and
put electrical wires on my fingers and toes and on my
penis, and I had a bag over my head." 

While military investigators interviewed the detainees
separately, many of them recalled the same event or
pattern of events and procedures in Tier 1A - a block
reserved for prisoners who were thought to possess
intelligence that could help thwart the insurgency in
Iraq, find Saddam Hussein or locate weapons of mass
destruction. 

Military intelligence officers took over the cell
block last October and were using military police to
help "set the conditions" for interrogations, said an
investigative report compiled by Major General Antonio
Taguba.

Several MPs have since said in statements and through
their lawyers that they were roughing up detainees at
the direction of US military intelligence officers.

While detainees said they could not identify some of
the soldiers because they either covered their name
patches or did not wear uniforms, eight of the
prisoners identified Specialist Graner, a member of
the 372nd Military Police Company, who is at the
centre of the abuse investigation. Detainees also
named Sergeant Javal Davis. Both face courts-martial.

Five other military police have been charged,
including Jeremy Sivits, who pleaded guilty on
Wednesday to abusing prisoners and was sentenced to a
year in jail and discharged from the army.
------------------------------------------------------
2)
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=4§ion=0&article=45445&d=22&m=5&y=2004

Arab News
May 22, 2004

More Prison Horrors Emerge
Naseer Al-Nahr 

-The photographs depict a US soldier apparently
preparing to strike a shackled detainee, a hooded
inmate collapsed with his wrists handcuffed to the
railing and a baton-wielding soldier appearing to
order a naked detainee covered in what looks like
excrement to walk a straight line, though his ankles
are shackled.
-One detainee said he witnessed a US Army translator
raping a boy of 15 at the prison, who shouted in pain.
Another detainee described US Army Specialist Charles
Graner and other US soldiers sodomizing an inmate with
a phosphoric light.

BAGHDAD — Hundreds of Iraqis were released yesterday
from the infamous Abu Ghraib prison here as more
instances of abuse of inmates surfaced.

According to a report in the Washington Post, some
prisoners at Abu Ghraib were ridden like animals,
fondled by female soldiers, forced to curse their
religion and required to retrieve their food from
toilets.

The Post also published new photographs and shots from
a video of the abuse and sexual humiliation of Iraq
prisoners by US soldiers. The newspaper said the
material, including secret sworn statements from
prisoners, came from evidence being assembled from
investigations into possible criminal charges against
US soldiers. 

The photographs depict a US soldier apparently
preparing to strike a shackled detainee, a hooded
inmate collapsed with his wrists handcuffed to the
railing and a baton-wielding soldier appearing to
order a naked detainee covered in what looks like
excrement to walk a straight line, though his ankles
are shackled.

The Post said it obtained hundreds of more pictures
and several digital videos of the abuse. In one photo,
a cornered inmate is cowering as a soldier tries to
restrain a large black dog with both hands. In
another, a soldier appears to be kneeling on naked
detainees.

In secret testimony to military investigators in
mid-January, detainees said they were beaten and
humiliated by American soldiers working the night
shift at Tier 1A in Abu Ghraib during Ramadan,
according to the Post.

The Post also said the detainees told investigators
they were forced to denounce Islam or force-fed pork
or liquor, required to masturbate in front of female
soldiers, threatened with rape, and made to walk on
all fours and bark like dogs.

“They said we will make you wish to die and it will
not happen,” the newspaper quoted one detainee,
identified as Ameen Saeed Al-Sheikh, as saying.

One detainee said he witnessed a US Army translator
raping a boy of 15 at the prison, who shouted in pain.
Another detainee described US Army Specialist Charles
Graner and other US soldiers sodomizing an inmate with
a phosphoric light.

Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, who oversaw the prison,
said that the new photos were shocking but reiterated
that she had seen no abuses of prisoners during the
time she oversaw the facility.

She said she had limited access to the cellblocks
where the abuses occurred because military
intelligence personnel oversaw interrogation of
prisoners and had panels installed over the doors and
windows.

....
“I’ve been waiting here for eight hours. I hope 16 of
my relatives will be released today,” said Hamed Idham
Jassem, 24, who says his brothers and cousins,
arrested last September, are jailed at Abu Ghraib.

There was jubilation for reunited families. Ahlam
Ahmed was overjoyed to embrace her grinning son, who
was delighted to be a free man again. “Alas, two of my
other sons have not been released. I’ll continue to
wait, but I’m frightened for them. I’ll only rest when
the last American soldier leaves the country,” she
said.

Prisoners pressed their faces against the grubby
windows, straining to pick out their own relatives
from the crowd. As each bus snaked its way out of the
prison gates, US soldiers battled to keep the crowd at
bay.

One elderly woman cried with joy, although her son was
not let out. “I am so happy to see these people freed.
They are not people from my family, but that’s how it
is,” said 64-year-old Suhad Abdeluahab Al-Sheikh.

She said her brother has been at Abu Ghraib for four
months. “I can’t see him because he is still being
interrogated. After everything I’ve heard, I’m scared
for him,” she added. Later, three of the buses pulled
up at the base of the paramilitary Iraqi Civil Defense
Corps at Amariyah nearby, where about 60 former
detainees got off, clutching blankets and bags.

—Additional input from agencies
------------------------------------------------------
3)
http://frontierpost.com.pk/topstories.asp#2

The Frontier Post (Pakistan)
May 21, 2004

Disgusting abuse images pile pressure on Bush 

WASHINGTON (Agencies): Hundreds of new images and
sworn statements from Iraqis held at Abu Ghraib prison
depict harrowing sexual humiliation and religious
intimidation at the hands of US soldiers well beyond
abuses reported previously, The Washington Post
reported on Friday. The 13 previously secret sworn
statements by detainees obtained by the Post added an
overt anti-Islamic dimension to the abuses, with
prisoners forced to renounce their religion, eat pork
and drink liquour in contravention of Islamic tenets.
The abuses were said to include prisoners being forced
to masturbate in front of female soldiers as well as
an army translator having sex with a boy 15 to 18
years old, an incident detainee Kasim Mehaddi Hilas
said was documented in photos taken by a female
soldier. “They forced us to walk like dogs on our
hands and knees,” detainee No. 13077, Hiadar Sabar
Ahed Miktub al-Aboodi, said. “We had to bark like a
dog, and if we didn’t do that they started hitting us
hard on our face and chest with no mercy.” The new
pictures and videos, with US soldiers shown laughing
and delighting in the abuses, the newspaper said,
amplified the picture of sexual humiliation and
violence in the prison and go beyond the photos
previously shown in the media. One 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. Photos and
videos from Abu Ghraib were presented to army
investigators in January. The images began surfacing
publicly last month, severely damag[ed] the United
States’ reputation in the Arab world. Excerpts from
the new videos were being broadcast around the world. 
....
The statements added allegations of prisoners being
ridden like animals, sodomized with a phosphoric
light, sexually fondled by female soldiers and forced
to retrieve their food from toilets, the newspaper
said. “They started to take photographs as if it was a
porn movie,” one detainee said in a statement on the
abuse of naked prisoners. US soldiers also turned the
cameras on themselves, filming scenes of consensual
sex, the Post said. 
....
------------------------------------------------------
4)
http://news.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=582492004

The Scotsman
May 22, 2004

Nightmare never ending at Abu Ghraib 
MARGARET NEIGHBOUR 

Prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison were ridden like
animals and subjected to harrowing sexual humiliation
and anti-Islamic intimidation, including being forced
to eat pork and drink alcohol, according to a new
report. 

Alongside disturbing new photographs and video images
of apparent abuse, the Washington Post printed 13
previously secret sworn statements by detainees that
the paper said came from evidence assembled from
investigations into possible criminal charges against
US soldiers. 

The photos depict a US soldier apparently preparing to
strike a shackled detainee, a hooded inmate collapsed
with his wrists handcuffed to a railing and a
baton-wielding soldier appearing to order a naked
detainee covered in a brown substance to walk a
straight line, although his ankles are shackled. 

The Post said it had obtained hundreds more pictures
and several digital videos of the abuse. In one photo,
a cornered inmate is cowering as a soldier tries to
restrain a large black dog with both hands. In
another, a soldier appears to be kneeling on naked
detainees. 

The abuses were said to include prisoners being forced
to masturbate in front of female soldiers as well as
an army translator having sex with a boy aged 15 to
18, an incident one detainee, Kasim Mehaddi Hilas,
said was documented in photos taken by a female
soldier. 

"They forced us to walk like dogs on our hands and
knees," detainee No 13077, Hiadar Sabar Ahed Miktub
al-Aboodi, said. "We had to bark like a dog, and if we
didn’t do that they started hitting us hard on our
face and chest with no mercy." 

Photos and videos from Abu Ghraib were presented to
army investigators in January. The images began
surfacing last month, severely damaging the United
States’ reputation in the Arab world. Excerpts from
the new videos were being broadcast around the world. 
....
The paper said the 65 pages of sworn statements were
taken in January. The statements recorded allegations
of prisoners being ridden like animals, sodomised with
a phosphoric light, sexually fondled by female
soldiers and forced to retrieve their food from
toilets, the newspaper said. 

"They started to take photographs as if it was a porn
movie," one detainee said in a statement on the abuse
of prisoners. US soldiers also turned the cameras on
themselves, filming scenes of consensual sex, the Post
said. 
....
• US AC-130 gunships and tanks battered militia
positions yesterday near two shrines in the holy city
of Karbala, killing 18 fighters loyal to rebel cleric
Muqtada al-Sadr, the US military said. 

Fighting between US forces and Sadr’s militia also was
heavy in Najaf and neighbouring Kufa, south of
Baghdad. Explosions rocked central Najaf, near local
government buildings, and Friday prayers were
cancelled.  
------------------------------------------------------
5)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/05/22/wirq22.xml&sSheet=/portal/2004/05/22/ixportal.html

The Telegraph (Britain)
May 22, 2004

Harvest of hate in a former haven of calm

-Local people accuse [British] soldiers of killing
Iraqi prisoners detained after the fighting and of
mutilating 10 corpses.
-"The British want to drive wedges of fear into our
hearts. They have no regard for humanity."
The Telegraph was taken to the hospital's mortuary to
see the corpses of two men killed in the fighting. One
had had his eyes gouged out and a blow to the side of
his head. The other had dog bite marks on his shoulder
and mutilated genitalia.
Family members identifying one of the corpses laid the
blame squarely at the feet of the British. "I will
kill every British soldier I see," screamed one.
-"Most of the older lads have done tours of Northern
Ireland, and were expecting to pass on our experience
of peacekeeping to the young ones. But we've never
been in anything like this before. This is like a
war."

As the British Government debates whether to send more
troops to Iraq, Jack Fairweather in Majar al-Kabir
looks at what could be in store for them

It is harvest time, and golden wheat is being threshed
on the fields outside the town of Majar al-Kabir in
southern Iraq. Yet the only crop British forces in the
region are reaping is of bitterness and hate.

The town, 150 miles north of Basra, has become the
fulcrum of a hitherto unreported resistance campaign
against British forces who are being ambushed every
day around the town and at nearby Amarah, previously a
haven of calm.

No troops have set foot in Majar for six weeks since
American moves to arrest the outlawed cleric Moqtada
al-Sadr sparked a Shia uprising in the south.
Residents give warning that should they do so, the
town will become the British version of Fallujah, the
standard-bearer of resistance to the US army.

Last week two Land Rovers belonging to the Argyll and
Sutherland Highlanders were repeatedly ambushed as
they drove past Majar on a routine mission. Two hours
of shooting left 27 Iraqis dead and three British
soldiers seriously wounded.

In the first ambush, militiamen from Sadr's Mahdi army
fired on the patrol from dug-in positions. Running
battles were then fought along the outskirts of the
town as the Land Rovers desperately tried to extricate
themselves.

After 45 minutes several Warrior armoured vehicles and
more than 100 soldiers arrived to rescue them and form
a protective cordon.

It was the most serious engagement undertaken by
British forces, and has left the residents of Majar
baying for further attacks.

Local people accuse soldiers of killing Iraqi
prisoners detained after the fighting and of
mutilating 10 corpses.

It is an accusation roundly dismissed as "ridiculous"
by the military. "The British Army doesn't do things
like that," said a spokesman.

However the military does say it removed 20 corpses
from the battle site and returned them to Majar's
hospital for burial only the next day. No reason has
been given for the removal of corpses, which is not
normal procedure.

The residents of Majar have their own explanation. At
the town's hospital, one of their leaders, Ali Amari,
said: "The British want to drive wedges of fear into
our hearts. They have no regard for humanity."

The Telegraph was taken to the hospital's mortuary to
see the corpses of two men killed in the fighting. One
had had his eyes gouged out and a blow to the side of
his head. The other had dog bite marks on his shoulder
and mutilated genitalia.

Family members identifying one of the corpses laid the
blame squarely at the feet of the British. "I will
kill every British soldier I see," screamed one.

Whoever disfigured the corpses - Sadr's militia may be
a possible suspect - the effect has been to turn a
hostile town into a tinderbox.

Majar has always been a rough-and-ready place. Tribes
in the town fought Saddam Hussein in the marshes and
do not take kindly to strangers.

In July, seven British military policemen were
cornered at a police station and killed by a mob of
several hundred. Tribal leaders said they objected to
intrusive house-to-house searches.

Since then Sadr's Mahdi army has moved into the dusty,
mud-brick town, neatly allying tribal grievances with
the cleric's radical agenda.

The British base of Abu Naji, 15 miles north of Majar,
looks like a caravan park in Arizona, but has the
atmosphere of Rorke's Drift.

Nightly rocket and mortar attacks have meant that for
the past month the 1,000 soldiers based there have had
to live under hard cover.

"I was queuing up for my grub last week when a mortar
landed 30 metres away from me," said Trooper Lee
Owens, 21, from Halifax. "I didn't let it ruin my
appetite though." Meals are now eaten inside shipping
containers.

Soldiers at the camp say they have been stunned by the
level of violence they have encountered in southern
Iraq.

Sgt Jerry Hewitt, 37, from Portsmouth, said: "Most of
the older lads have done tours of Northern Ireland,
and were expecting to pass on our experience of
peacekeeping to the young ones. But we've never been
in anything like this before. This is like a war."

The troops know they will have to go into Majar soon.
Major Helen Bryan, head of civil-military affairs,
said: "We've got a lot of reconstruction projects to
begin, if the people will only let us work with them.
Right now they are not very happy with us."
....
------------------------------------------------------
6)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/05/22/wirq222.xml&sSheet=/news/2004/05/22/ixnewstop.html

The Telegraph (Britain)
May 22, 2004

'I have not killed but, God willing, I soon will'

Julius Strauss meets the Mahdi army as it takes on
American forces in and around the Shia holy city of
Najaf

-"We have blown up an American tank," he said
triumphantly, as a pall of smoke began to spiral into
the sky.
"I have been fighting for a month now against the
American infidels. They are murderers and have given
us nothing. So far I have not killed but, God willing,
I soon will."
-"Do not believe what the Americans tell you. They
kill two or three of our men and say they have killed
30."
-"I am no fan of Moqtada al-Sadr but it is the
Americans who are causing our suffering. Every day
they kill innocent people. They should just leave our
country. They promised democracy and freedom but all
they have delivered is torture and abuse."

A hundred yards to the north stretched the Wadi
al-Salam, the Valley of Peace, the largest Shia
cemetery in the world. Less than a mile to the west
lay an American base, manned by the 1st Armoured
Division, probably the most dangerous posting in Iraq.

At the intersection just below, a dozen young fighters
crouched behind a high stone wall. Just before noon,
the fighting began in earnest.

It was ushered in by a burst of sustained rifle fire
and an answering salvo from an American heavy
machine-gun. One of the fighters knelt and fired.

A mortar round fell among the ancient tombstones a few
hundred yards away throwing up a small cloud of dust.

In the large, dusty market of Najaf, people began to
panic.

By now men, women and children were running for cover.
But for 20-year-old Taha, an English-speaking student
of engineering, the fighting was music to his ears.

Dressed in a long, grey shirt with a black headscarf
covering everything except his eyes, he was panting
from the exertion of the battle.

"We have blown up an American tank," he said
triumphantly, as a pall of smoke began to spiral into
the sky.

"I have been fighting for a month now against the
American infidels. They are murderers and have given
us nothing. So far I have not killed but, God willing,
I soon will."

Another former student, Hussein, 26, came running over
to join him.

"We have damaged five American vehicles," he said. "Do
not believe what the Americans tell you. They kill two
or three of our men and say they have killed 30."

Some of the claims the Mahdi army made yesterday were
certainly exaggerated. One man said he had killed 32
Americans and destroyed several tanks. One "tank"
turned out to be a petrol station.

Local sources said three civilians were killed and six
injured, but that was impossible to verify as the
hospital lay in no man's land. There was no credible
word on American casualties.

But whatever the statistics, there is no disguising
the fact that hundreds of angry young Shias - some
poor and ill-educated, others from relatively well-off
families - are flocking to the Mahdi army.
....
Hussein, 22, was injured last week in an attack on an
American armoured column. He showed the small wounds
in his head and shoulder where shrapnel had embedded
itself.

He said: "Before the uprising I lived in Sadr City and
ran a small builder's merchant. But I closed it two
months ago and came here with my two brothers to
fight.

"When the Americans have left I will return and open
the shop again."

Hussan, a 23-year-old builder, said: "All this
fighting and death has become part of our everyday
life. The shooting barely stops.

"I am no fan of Moqtada al-Sadr but it is the
Americans who are causing our suffering. Every day
they kill innocent people. They should just leave our
country. They promised democracy and freedom but all
they have delivered is torture and abuse."
------------------------------------------------------
7)
http://www.ptd.net/webnews/wed/bk/Amideast-protests.RKFQ_EyL.html

Associated Press
May 21, 2004

Shiites Rally Across Mideast Against U.S. 

BEIRUT, Lebanon - Tens of thousands of Shiite Muslims
demonstrated in Beirut Friday to warn the United
States against attacking holy sites in Iraq. Smaller
groups rallied in three other Mideast nations, with
protesters in Bahrain clashing with police.

Wearing white shrouds symbolizing their readiness to
die in defense of the holy cities of Najaf and Karbala
in Iraq, more than 200,000 protesters marched through
Beirut's suburbs. Many chanted "death to America,
death to Israel."

Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah accused U.S.
forces of desecrating holy shrines in Iraq, and called
on Muslims to fight to the death for the two Iraqi
cities. Hezbollah fought an 18-year guerrilla war that
led to Israel's withdrawal from southern Lebanon in
2000.

"Let the Americans understand that those who wore
shrouds today, including clerics, men, women, children
and adults, did not come to show off," Nasrallah said.
"We will not abandon our religious duty. Today's march
is a step on the road to defending the holy sites."

Shiite Muslim communities in Lebanon, Iran and Bahrain
have been outraged by continued fighting in Karbala
and Najaf, which are home to shrines that are among
the most sacred in Shia Islam.

In Manama, Bahrain, police fired tear gas to disperse
about 5,000 demonstrators, but the angry crowd broke
through the police blockade and continued its march to
protest the fighting in Karbala and Najaf, shouting,
"Death to America!"

"Our shrines are our lives. Leave them alone!" one
banner read.

The nearly two-mile march had been approved by
security authorities, but police tried to stop the
demonstrators halfway through, but protesters kept on
moving and turned over an empty police car and set it
on fire.

Bahrain's king Sheik Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa fired
his interior minister, saying the march should have
been allowed to go on. A royal decree replaced
Interior Minister Sheik Mohammed bin Khalifa
Al-Khalifa with Gen. Rashed bin Abdallah bin Ahmed
Al-Khalifa.

"What happened between the police and the protesters
didn't please us," the royal statement said. It said
citizens had the right to protest against "the
violation of the holy cities and what happened in
Iraqi prisons" - a reference to the physical and
sexual abuse of Iraqi detainees.

In Tehran Iran, police shoved an advancing crowd,
beating them with sticks, as about 200 protesters
outside the British Embassy threw stones and
firecrackers, demanding the embassy be closed and the
ambassador expelled. "Down with Israel, UK, USA," read
a banner.

In Amman, Jordan, around 1,000 worshippers held a
one-hour sit-in in front of al-Husseini Mosque to
protest Arab silence on Israel's recent incursion into
the Gaza Strip that left at least 40 Palestinians
dead.

The protesters carried red and green Jordanian and
Palestinian flags. They shouted the battle cry of
"Allah Akbar," or God is great, and "America is the
head of the snake."

The U.S. military has said it is doing its best to
avoid damage to the shrines in Iraq. In fighting last
week, the Imam Ali mosque received four holes in its
golden dome, and both sides blamed each other for the
damage. The mosque is the burial place of the Prophet
Muhammad's cousin and son-in-law, who is revered by
Shiites.
------------------------------------------------------
8)
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_22-5-2004_pg7_35

Daily Times (Pakistan)
May 22, 2004

Shias protest Iraq killings and prisoner abuse

ISLAMABAD - The Shia community protested at China
Chowk on Friday against the killing of innocent
Iraqis, the disrespectful treatment of holy places
such as Hazrat Imam Hussain’s shrine and the targeted
killing of Shia leaders.

The demonstrators held placards inscribed with slogans
against the abuse of power by the military personnel
of America and its allies in Iraq.

Sabtain Kazmi, a local leader of the Shia community,
while addressing the gathering said that the US and
allied troops have suppressed the Iraqi people and
were treating Iraqi prisoners inhumanely. 

He said that the designs of anti-Islam forces would
not succeed in Iraq. He also criticised the role of
the United Nations.

He asked the United Nations to place pressure on the
US and coalition forces to pull out of Iraq and hand
over sovereignty to the Iraqi people. Referring to the
killings in Indian Held Kashmir and Palestine, he said
that United Nations has turned a blind eye to these
sensitive issues.
....
------------------------------------------------------
9)
http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_770983,00050004.htm

Reuters
May 21, 2004

Gunmen kill four Iraqi security forces 

Baquba - Gunmen opened fire on a checkpoint near the
northern Iraqi city of Baquba on Friday, killing four
members of Iraq's security forces, medics and
witnesses said.

The assailants used light weapons and rockets in the
attack on US-backed Iraqi Civil Defence Corps (ICDC)
near Baquba, a town 65 km north of the capital,
witnesses said.

Iraqi security forces and police charged with taking
over security in Iraq have frequently come under fire
from insurgents fighting US occupation troops and
anyone seen cooperating with them.
------------------------------------------------------
10)
http://www.irna.ir/?SAB=OK&LANG=EN&PART=_HOME&TYPE=HP&id=200405211047221

Islamic Republic News Agency (Iran)
May 21, 2004

Iran condemns US strike on Iraqi border town  

Tehran - Iran`s Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid-Reza 
Asefi here Thursday condemned a US air raid on an
Iraqi town near the Syrian border which killed dozens
of civilians. 

Asefi termed the strike as an inhumane act which
killed some family members in the border town of Makr
al-Qaim who were attending a wedding ceremony, said
the Information and Press Department of the 
Foreign Ministry. 

He added that harsh and military approaches adopted by
the occupying forces will cause spread of instability
and insecurity in all parts of Iraq. 

Asefi also called for an appropriate world reaction to
such blameworthy and inhumane acts. 

At least 41 civilians were killed on Wednesday in a US
air raid on the Iraqi town of Makr al-Qaim near the
Syrian border. 

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