Acil Tabbara, Agence France Presse

CAIRO, 3 May 2004 — Images of apparent abuse by British soldiers of Iraqi troops following similar pictures involving US coalition troops triggered the wrath of Arab public opinion yesterday.

“After the shock of the torture inflicted by American soldiers, the Daily Mirror reveals another scandal by reporting on abuse committed by British soldiers against Iraqi troops,” the Egyptian government daily Al-Ahram said.

“The world is still under shock from the pictures of torture carried out in (Baghdad’s) Abu Gharib prison by the American soldiers,” the daily said under a banner headline.

Like most Egyptian newspapers, Al-Ahram carried on its front page the pictures published Saturday in Britain’s mass-circulation Daily Mirror newspaper appearing to show troops beating and urinating on an Iraqi prisoner.

“Condemnations by the United States and Britain are not enough,” Al-Ahram said. It called for the “rapid formation of an international tribunal (to) judge the soldiers who perpetrated these crimes”.

Echoing commentaries in other Arab capitals, Al-Ahram insisted that the only way to end such actions was to put an end to the occupation of Iraq by the US-led coalition forces.

A commentary by editor in chief of the weekly Egyptian newspaper Al-Usbu Mustafa Bakri asked, “How long are we going to stay silent?”

A day after publishing pictures of US soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners, Jordan’s three main dailies also splashed the images of apparent abuse by British soldiers against Iraqi detainees.

Columnists denounced the “humiliating” action which many described as “war crimes”.

“The revelation of such atrocities further strengthens the calls of the international community to hand over the Iraqi dossier to the United Nations,” the editor in chief of Al-Arab Al-Yawm daily said.

An editorialist in Al-Dustour newspaper described the abuse attributed to US soldiers in Abu Gharib prison as “an earthquake that shook the conscience of the world” and said it was the action of “the orphans of the Ku Klux Klan”.

Syria’s official daily Ath-Thawra charged it was “proof that the acts of torture” are widespread. “An investigation will reveal frightening details,” it predicted.

The secretary general of the Iraqi committee of Sunni Muslim theologians, Hareth Al-Dari, said his group informed the coalition that “much worse” acts are being committed in Abu Gharib and other jails than what has been reported.

Jordanian Student Beaten in Custody

A Jordanian university student recently released from US custody was quoted yesterday as saying in Amman he was systematically beaten and deprived of sleep through his three months’ detention.

Huthaifah Faris Shabib, a graduate in Islamic Code (Shariah) in Baghdad, said he was arrested early in the year with four Jordanian colleagues, accused of resistance and shooting at US troops.

“The US troops stormed our residence at dawn in Al-Athamayeh Sunni quarter in Baghdad,” Shabib told Al-Rai newspaper. He said the other four were still being held.

The five were first taken to an airport makeshift prison, then transferred to Abu Gharib prison, symbol of Saddam Hussein’s brutal rule.

Shahib alleged that American soldiers had confiscated from the Jordanian students $20,000 set aside to settle university fees and cover their expenses in Iraq. They had also confiscated computer sets and cars.

Dozens of Jordanians have been killed in the throes of the war in Iraq and its wake. While the Jordanian government has estimated the number of Jordanian prisoners there at 30, parliamentary committees charge that there are 1,000 Jordanian prisoners in Iraq.