Legal Commentary

Wikileaks Discloses Iraqi Torture Docs

By Jeralyn

Wikileaks has published 400,000 pages of military documents from 2004 to 2009 revealing details of murder and torture. It's the largest leak of military documents in history.

"There are over 300 recorded reports of coalition forces committing torture and abuse of detainees across 284 reports and over 1,000 cases of Iraqi security forces committing similar crimes," WikiLeaks said in a press release.

"There are numerous cases of what appear to be clear war crimes by US forces, such as the deliberate killing of persons trying to surrender," WikiLeaks said.

Via the LA Times: [More...]

The most explosive documents are reports suggesting that U.S. forces knew about but failed to stop numerous cases of prisoner abuse by Iraqi police and soldiers, according to accounts by several news organizations that were given early access to the files by WikiLeaks.

The documents, known in the U.S. military as "significant activities" reports, describe in minute detail what U.S. troops in Iraq encountered on a daily basis from 2003 to this year, from daily casualty notifications and routine descriptions of attacks to sensitive intelligence tips and accounts of meetings.

Full post as published by TalkLeft on October 22, 2010 (boomark / email).