ICC launches investigation into UK Iraq prisoner abuse claims — RT News
ICC launches investigation into UK Iraq prisoner abuse claims — RT News:
The International Criminal Court has reopened a preliminary investigation into claims that UK forces abused detainees in Iraq between 2003 and 2008, after new allegations were submitted.
“The new information... alleges the responsibility of officials of the United Kingdom for war crimes involving systematic detainee abuse in Iraq from 2003 to 2008,” Chief Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda said in a statement released by the Hague-based ICC.
In January, the Berlin-based European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights, alongside Birmingham-based Public Interest Lawyers (PIL), filed documents alleging torture.
It was alleged that prisoners had been threatened with rape, death, were sexually assaulted and were additionally forcefully exposed to “pornography and sexual acts between soldiers.”
Alleged systematic abuse committed by members of the UK’s armed forces has been categorically denied by the British government.
“The government completely rejects the allegation that there was systematic abuse carried out by the British armed forces in Iraq,” Attorney General Dominic Grieve told the BBC.
A British soldier patrols a street in the southern city of Basra.(AFP Photo / Essam AL-Sudani)
