Fill out this form to email this article to a friend
Ex-prime minister decries abuses
Associated Press
Published November 28, 2005
BAGHDAD - Iraq's former interim prime minister complained Sunday that human rights abuses by some in the new government are as bad now as they were under Saddam Hussein.
Ayad Allawi, a secular Shiite Muslim, told the London newspaper The Observer that fellow Shiites are responsible for death squads and secret torture centers and said brutality by elements of Iraqi security forces rivals that of Hussein's secret police.
"People are remembering the days of Saddam. These were the precise reasons that we fought Saddam and now we are seeing the same thing," the newspaper quoted Allawi as saying.
Allawi's allegation of widespread human rights abuses follows the discovery this month of up to 173 detainees, some malnourished and showing signs of torture, in a Shiite-led Interior Ministry building in Baghdad.
"People are doing the same as Saddam's time and worse," he said. "It is an appropriate comparison."
Senator says Bush should make public presentation
Sen. John Warner, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, on Sunday suggested that President Bush use an FDR-style presentation to update people on progress in the war in Iraq.
Warner, R-Va., recalled on NBC's Meet the Press that during World War II, President Franklin D. Roosevelt often went on the radio in "fireside chats" to explain to the nation in detail the conduct of the war in Europe and Asia.
"It would bring him closer to the people, dispel some of this concern that understandably our people have, about the loss of life and limb, the enormous cost of this war to the American public," he said.
Congressmen hurt when military vehicle overturns
A military vehicle carrying U.S. politicians overturned on the way to the Baghdad airport Saturday, injuring two congressmen, a fellow congressman traveling with them said.
Rep. Tim Murphy, R-Pa., was airlifted to a military hospital in Germany for an MRI on his neck, and Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., was sent to a Baghdad hospital, said U.S. Rep. Jim Marshall, a Georgia Democrat, who was in the vehicle but was not hurt.
MARINE KILLED: The U.S. military reported that a Marine assigned to the 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing was killed Saturday when his vehicle struck a roadside bomb near Camp Taqaddum, 45 miles west of Baghdad.
[Last modified November 28, 2005, 01:05:08]
Share your thoughts on this story
|
News
Fifty years ago, they were screwed-up kids sent to the Florida School for Boys to be straightened out. But now they are screwed-up men, scarred by the whippings they endured. Read the story and see a video and portrait gallery.
Print
Email story
Comment
Email editor
