WASHINGTON - The U.S. military has found a total of 94 cases of confirmed or alleged abuse of prisoners by U.S. soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan since the fall of 2001, the Army’s inspector general said Thursday in a long-awaited report made public at a hastily called Senate hearing.
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The Pentagon had refused until now to give a total number of abuse allegations since the prisoner abuse scandal broke this spring. The 94 number is significantly higher than all other previous estimates given by Pentagon officials.
The inspector general investigation, ordered Feb. 10 after the allegations of abuse at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq came to the attention of top Army officials in Washington, concluded that there were no systemic problems that contributed to the abuse. In some cases, the report found, the abuse was abetted or facilitated by officers not following proper procedures.
Most cases occurred at time of capture
Most of the alleged abuses — 45 of the 94 — happened at the point where the detainee was captured, said Lt. Gen. Paul Mikolashek, the Army’s inspector general. Of those 45 cases, 20 involved allegations of physical abuse and the rest were allegations of theft or other crimes, he said.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5487793/
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