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Bush To Go On Arab TV Over Abuse |
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"This is an
opportunity for the president to speak directly to the people in Arab nations
and let them know that the images that we all have seen are shameless and
unacceptable," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said Tuesday night.
McClellan said the two
10-minute interviews were scheduled for Wednesday. Other administration
officials tried to assure the American public and the world that the abuse of
prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison near Secretary of State
Colin Powell said he was shocked by the revelations but that a "fairly
small number of soldiers" was involved. "I was in a unit
that was responsible for My Lai," Powell, a former Army general, said on
CNN's "Larry King Live" program, referring to the notorious 1968
incident when U.S. soldiers gunned down hundreds of Vietnamese villagers in
what was thought to be a Viet Cong stronghold. "I got there after In the face of
worldwide condemnation, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld called the
images of physical and sexual abuses at Abu Ghraib "totally unacceptable
and un-American," adding that no one should believe the behavior
captured in the photographs was tolerated. "The actions by Condoleezza Rice,
Bush's national security adviser, told the Arab television network Al Arabiya
that Bush was "determined to find out if there is any wider problem than
just what happened at Abu Ghraib. And so he has told Secretary Rumsfeld that
he expects an investigation, a full accounting." In a sign the probe of
prisoner treatment was widening, Army investigators
determined the death of the prisoner in November was a homicide, and turned
the case over to the Justice Department, which was investigating, Army
officials said Tuesday. An additional 20 deaths and assaults of prisoners
were still under investigation, they said. So far, six military
police face charges that may lead to courts-martial; seven more have been
disciplined administratively. Rumsfeld offered few
new details of what had taken place at Abu Ghraib, a notorious prison during
Saddam Hussein's regime that was taken over by It was Maj. Gen. Donald
Ryder, the Army provost marshal, who acknowledged the homicide finding. Other
Army officials provided some details, including that it involved a CIA
contractor. The circumstances of the death and the identity of both the
interrogator and prisoner were uncertain. The Justice Department
and CIA declined comment on any specifics, although the CIA had said
previously that its inspector general was looking into the circumstances of
the death of an Iraqi prisoner at Abu Ghraib. The Army also said one
soldier had been court-martialed for using excessive force in shooting to
death an Iraqi prisoner in September. The Iraqi prisoner, who was not at Abu
Ghraib, was throwing rocks at the soldier. The soldier was reduced in rank
and dismissed from the Army, an official said. Since December 2002,
the Army has investigated the deaths of 25 people in Another 10 cases of
abuse, assault and other crimes on prisoners also remained under
investigation, Ryder said. Many of the allegations
of abuse were contained in an internal Pentagon report completed in March. Senate Minority Leader
Tom Daschle, D-S.D., demanded to know why Bush was not earlier informed of
the report and why Rumsfeld and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Richard
Myers had not yet read the two-month-old document. Bush's spokesman,
McClellan, said the president first became aware of the allegations of abuse
some time after the Pentagon began looking into it, but did not see the
pictures until they were made public last week. Bush did not learn of the classified
Pentagon report until news organizations reported its existence, McClellan
said. Rumsfeld rejected
suggestions that part of the Bush administration's justification for invading
In The new commander of
U.S.-run prisons in The |
