Camp Bucca reveals more dirty secrets

[CShine]

For Sattar Shukri Abdulla, it was another weary day in Camp Bucca, a bleak, often violence-racked, prison camp in the far south of Iraq. But then the Iraqi labourer was approached by some British officers with an odd request: could he come and take a look at some soldiers nearby?

Mr Abdulla found himself taking part in an impromptu identification parade, in the prison camp near Umm Qasr, to point out the Queen's Lancashire Regiment troops who had allegedly beaten and tortured him several weeks earlier. And, Mr Abdulla has told a British law firm, he got a clear look at the suspects and identified at least one of them.

He is now a key witness in one of the most damaging controversies over British army conduct in Iraq. His testimony could play a crucial part in the prosecution of up to six QLR soldiers on charges of torturing another Iraqi civilian, the hotel receptionist Baha Mousa, to death in September last year.

As The Independent on Sunday revealed last week, Mr Abdulla was one of five men arrested with Mr Mousa who have now come forward to testify about their alleged torture and ill-treatment by the QLR. Their witness statements, which claim their beatings were overseen by a British officer, are expected to play a central role in a High Court hearing in July into allegations that British troops have illegally killed more than 20 Iraqi civilians in mistaken shootings, beatings and riots.

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=526331