Iain Cobain of The Guardian writes that British soldiers and airmen who helped to operate a secretive US detention facility in Baghdad that was at the centre of some of the most serious human rights abuses to occur in Iraq after the invasion have, for the first time, spoken about abuses they witnessed there.
Read his account, published in the 1 April edition, at http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/apr/01/camp-nama-iraq-human-rights-abuses.
I wonder what consideration our Government gave to the fact that this is not an aberration, but part and parcel of the American way of war. I think we must have had some understanding because my understanding is that, like the British, when we think we are likely to capture prisoners we like to take an American along to be the official captor, so that we don't find ourselves in the legal position of handing prisoners over to the Americans. That is a fig-leaf. The real question is, do we want to associate ourselves with this kind of behaviour, and do we think it contributes to the chances of success of whatever exercise we are engaged in?
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