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By Associated PressFALLUJAH, Iraq - U.S. troops have found close to 20 "atrocity sites" used by insurgents to imprison, torture and kill hostages in Fallujah, a U.S. military officer said Sunday.
Marine Maj. Jim West said that in addition to numerous weapons caches, troops clearing the city after a major U.S.-led offensive had found rooms containing knives and black hoods, "many of them blood-covered."
Briefing reporters at a base outside Fallujah, West said one room had "handprints on the walls and along the sides of the walls."
"There was blood covering the entire wall and along the floorboard area," West said.
He said troops had found signs of "torture, murder, very gruesome sights."
"We found numerous houses where people were just chained to a wall for extended periods of time," he added.
West did not provide more details, but said "a few less than 20" such sites had been found in the city, a stronghold for insurgents 40 miles west of Baghdad.
At least 34 foreign hostages have been killed by their captors in Iraq this year, including three Americans. Many of the victims have been beheaded and their deaths shown on grisly videos posted on the Internet. Iraqi police and other security forces have also been killed after their capture by insurgents.
West said more than 1,400 people were detained in connection with the Fallujah offensive. More than 400 of them have been released after interrogators determined they were noncombatants.
The military says an estimated 1,200 insurgents and more than 50 U.S. troops have been killed in the assault.
On Friday, Lt. Col. John Sattler, commander of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, said this month's offensive had "broken the back" of the insurgency. But U.S. troops and their Iraqi colleagues have continued to come under attack while searching for holdouts.
Marine Lt. Col. Daniel Wilson said troops were searching an estimated 30,000 to 50,000 buildings that could contain pockets of resistance. He said small numbers of insurgents managed to move in and out of the city but that a U.S. Army cordon around Fallujah kept most of the rebels contained.