Some prisoners at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison were ridden like animals, fondled by female soldiers, forced to curse their religion and required to retrieve their food from toilets, according to a published report Friday.

The Washington Post, in its Friday editions, also published new photographs and shots from a video of the alleged abuse and sexual humiliation of Iraq prisoners by US soldiers. The newspaper said the material, including secret sworn statements from prisoners, came from evidence being assembled from investigations into possible criminal charges against US soldiers.

The photographs depict a US soldier apparently preparing to strike a shackled detainee, a hooded inmate collapsed with his wrists handcuffed to the railing and a baton-wielding soldier appearing to order a naked detainee covered in a brown substance to walk a straight line, though his ankles are shackled.

The Post said it obtained hundreds more pictures and several digital videos of the abuse. In one photo, a cornered inmate is cowering as a soldier tries to restrain a large black dog with both hands. In another, a soldier appears to be kneeling on naked detainees.

In secret testimony to military investigators in mid-January, detainees said they were beaten and humiliated by American soldiers working the night shift at Tier 1A in Abu Ghraib during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, according to the Post.

The Post also said detainees told investigators they were forced to denounce Islam or force-fed pork or liquor, required to masturbate in front of female soldiers, threatened with rape, and made to walk on all their hands and knees and bark like dogs.

"They said we will make you wish to die and it will not happen," the newspaper quoted one detainee, identified as Ameen Saeed Al-Sheik, as saying

(China Daily via agencies May 22, 2004)