UN calls for US to investigate torture claims revealed in leaked reports

UN calls for US to investigate torture claims revealed in leaked reports ; Manfred Nowak, the UN's special rapporteur on torture, told the BBC the US President Barack Obama had an "obligation" to carry out an independent and objective investigation. "There is an obligation to investigate whenever there are credible allegations torture has happened – and these allegations are more than credible – and then it is up to the courts," he said.

"It is then up to the courts on the one hand to bring the perpetrators to justice and also on the other hand to provide the victims with adequate reparation for the harm they have suffered."

It follows the release of almost 400,000 secret US military logs, by the Wikileaks website, which suggest US commanders ignored evidence of torture by the Iraqi authorities.
The classified documents, which comprise the largest leak in US history, also suggest:

* Iraqi forces systematically beat and tortured prisoners, including women and children.

* A US gunship crew killed two insurgents on the ground even though the pilots had reported that the men were trying to surrender.

* The US kept records of civilian deaths, despite previously denying it. The death toll was put at 109,000, including more than 15,000 deaths that were previously unrecorded.

* Two Iraqis complained of being abused by British troops in June 2008 but no formal investigation was carried out.

* Hundreds of civilians, including women and children, were killed at US military checkpoints after the invasion in 2003.

* British soldiers repeatedly came under attack from US forces in a series of 'friendly fire' incidents.

* Iran supplied chemical weapons to Iraqi militias for attacks against civilians and US targets.

The US has criticised the release of the documents by the whistle-blowing website. Hillary Clinton, US Secretary of State, condemned "in the most clear terms" the leaks of any documents putting Americans at risk. The Pentagon warned that releasing secret military documents could endanger US troops and Iraqi civilians.

"By disclosing such sensitive information, Wikileaks continues to put at risk the lives of our troops, their coalition partners and those Iraqis and Afghans working with us," said Geoff Morrell, the Pentagon press secretary. He said the documents were "essentially snapshots of events, both tragic and mundane, and do not tell the whole story."

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange told al-Jazeera television that together with public interest lawyers in the UK, the website had "produced papers for a lawsuit for 40 wrongful killings in Iraq".  He later told a news conference in London that they were seeking to create the "maximum political impact possible" through their latest release.

"This disclosure is about the truth," he said. "We hope to correct some of that attack on the truth that occurred before the war, during the war, and which has continued on since the war officially concluded." He added: "While I am not sure we have achieved the maximum possible (political impact) I think we are getting pretty close."

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