Days after his resignation, outgoing US Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld and other American officials may face criminal prosecution
in Germany for their alleged roles in abuses at the military-run
prisons at Abu Ghraib, Iraq, and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
New legal documents, to be filed next week with Germany's top
prosecutor, would seek a criminal investigation and prosecution of
Rumsfeld, along with Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, former CIA
director George Tenet and other senior US civilian and military
officers, the Time magazine reported on Friday.
The plaintiffs in the case included 11 Iraqis who were detained
at Abu Ghraib, as well as Mohammad al-Qahtani, a Saudi held at
Guantanamo, whom the US identified as the so-called "20th hijacker"
and a would-be participant in the 9/11 hijackings, the report
said.
Qahtani underwent a "special interrogation plan," personally
approved by Rumsfeld, which the United States said produced
valuable intelligence. But to obtain it, according to the log of
his interrogation and government reports, Qahtani was subjected to
forced nudity, sexual humiliation, religious humiliation, prolonged
stress positions, sleep deprivation and other controversial
interrogation techniques.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs said that one of the witnesses who
would testify on their behalf was former Brigadier General Janis
Karpinski, the one-time commander of all US military prisons in
Iraq.
Karpinski, who the lawyers said would be in Germany next week to
publicly address her accusations in the case, had issued a written
statement to accompany the legal filing, which said, in part: "It
was clear the knowledge and responsibility [for what happened at
Abu Ghraib] goes all the way to the top of the chain of command to
the Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld."
Germany was chosen for the court filing because German law
provides "universal jurisdiction" allowing for the prosecution of
war crimes and related offenses that take place anywhere in the
world. A legal action was brought in Germany in 2004, which also
sought the prosecution of Rumsfeld.
US officials had warned that the case could impact US-Germany
relations adversely. Rumsfeld had indicated he would not attend a
major security conference in Munich unless Germany disposed of the
case.
(Xinhua News Agency November 11, 2006)
