C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 BAGHDAD 002547

SIPDIS

FROM REO MOSUL

E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/16/2025
TAGS: PHUM PTER MOPS IZ
SUBJECT: ISLAMIC HUMAN RIGHTS ORGANIZATION ALLEGES IRAQI
FORCES DETAINEE ABUSE IN NINEWA

Classified By: Political Counselor Robert S. Ford.
Reasons 1.4 (B) and (D).

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Summary
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1. (C) Members of the Islamic Organization for Human
Rights (IOHR) told Poloff June 9 that abuse of
detainees by Iraqi Police (IP) occurs regularly. The
group has investigated at least 25 specific
allegations of torture and abuse, compiled into a
public report, associated with a group of police
commandos known as the Wolf Brigade. The IOHR
representatives said they had not received complaints
about Coalition Forces treatment of detainees, though
they did accuse Coalition soldiers of excesses and
disrespectful behavior during operations and said they
held the Coalition, as an occupying force, as
ultimately responsible for all human rights
violations. The group requested assistance in
arranging visits to both Iraqi and Coalition detention
facilities. The organization's members came across as
credible, and their allegations about the Wolf Brigade
are consistent with other reporting. U.S. officials
have raised these allegations with Mosul officials.
Local authorities and the police evince determination
to improve the situation, but they want help from the
Ministry of Justice and the judicial system. End
summary.


2. (C) Regional Embassy Office Mosul Poloff met on
June 8 with IOHR representatives Haarith Ibraheem
(IOHR director), Usama Sadi (deputy director), and
Qais Abdulwahab Issa (an IOHR member and REO Mosul IV
nominee). Ibraheem and Issa are legal professors in
the Mosul area and Sadi has a master's degree in
international law.

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An Islamic Human Rights Organization
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3. () The IOHR was founded just after the fall of
the former regime, which had prohibited human rights
organizations, and has its main offices in Mosul and a
branch in Baghdad. Ibraheem said that volunteers
formed the organization to document human rights
abuses. Sadi said the group had regularly visited
jails and prisons in the Mosul area, including the

main Coalition detention facility, prior to the
November 2004 outbreak of insurgent activity. Sadi
said the group's methodology requires multiple sources
for documenting abuse, usually with eyewitnesses,
second hand sources, and photographic evidence.
According to the group's literature, they have issued
several reports on detainee conditions in Mosul, the
western Ninewa city of Tel Afer, and Abu Ghraib
prison. Ibraheem said his organization participated
in an international human rights conference in Jordan
last September at which he started up contacts with
international human rights NGOs such as Amnesty
International and Human Rights Watch as well as the
United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI).


4. (C) Philosophically, the group claims an Islamic
conception of human rights emanating from the freedoms
granted by Allah. The representatives said they
subscribe to most international human rights standards
except for women's rights, which has a distinct
treatment in the Koran. The group claims to defend
all people regardless of religion or ethnicity; the
group's reports, for example, do not identify the
victims by faith or ethnic group. The representatives
stated their complete rejection of terrorism. They
denied any affiliation to political parties, though
they conceded that the Iraqi Islamic Party (IIP) often
lobbies authorities to let IOHR conduct prison visits.

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Allegations Against the 2nd Iraqi Police Commandos
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5. (C) The group released in May a new report
documenting 25 cases of detainee abuse, the majority
of which are related to the 2nd Iraqi Police Commandos
Unit, known as the Wolf Brigade, that was stationed in
Mosul earlier this year. Sadi claimed that six
detainee deaths occurred as a result of torture. The
group described practices such as use of stun guns,
hanging suspects from their wrists with arms behind
back, holding detainees in basements with human waste,
and beatings. Sadi said interrogators also reportedly
threatened detainees with demeaning acts against their
wives and sisters, a particularly flagrant violation
to a Muslim. Sadi said some detainees were forced to
confess to crimes -- not all related to terrorism,
Sadi admitted -- they did not commit as a result of
this treatment. (Note: REO Mosul forwarded this
report in Arabic to Embassy Baghdad for translation.
End note.)


6. (C) Issa said that Iraqi Police continue to
violate detainees' rights to due process and
presumption of innocence. He said Mosul judges had
issued release orders for some detainees only to have
them ignored by the Mosul Chief of Police. Issa said
even after the decision is made not to charge
detainees with a crime, they are turned over to Iraqi
Police facilities for a week before release, during
which time abuse occurs. (Note: Iraqi officials
recently visited the MNF-NW Detention facility, the
Mosul Regional Correctional Facility and the Police
stations. In the first two instances, provincial
council representatives noted that the detainees were
treated well. In the case of the police facilities,
the PC noted overcrowding and unsanitary conditions
attributable to the lack of effort by Iraqi courts to
try the cases of almost 1000 detainees in Ninewah.
They also noted allegations of abuse mostly
attributable to the Wolf Brigade but also the local
police. End Note.)

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Coalition Forces Mistreat and Disrespect Iraqis
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7. (C) Asked whether they alleged abuse of detainees
by Coalition Forces, the group said they believed
detainees are treated with respect, though they noted
they had not been permitted to enter a Coalition
facility since November. Ibraheem said IOHR holds the
Coalition, as an occupying force, responsible for all
human rights abuses that occur. Ibraheem mentioned
that the Coalition was holding four or five women from
the Mosul area, which he said is particularly
offensive for Muslims. Poloff reminded them that the
Coalition monitors such issues closely, provides human
rights training for IP, and intervenes when cases
merit. Issa accused Coalition soldiers of excesses
during operations, including the indiscriminant
shooting of civilians, disrespect of civilians during
raids, and theft of property. Issa alleged that his
own father and brother were shot by Coalition Forces
months earlier as they were driving through the
infamous Yarmuk Traffic Circle in Mosul, a favorite
target for insurgent IEDs.

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Request to Visit Jails and Prisons
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8. (C) The IOHR said their two objectives are to
resume visits to Coalition and Iraqi detention
facilities and to bring about prosecutions of human
rights violators within the IP. They said they had
yet to be granted access to detention centers in Irbil
in Kurdistan where some detainees are taken. Sadi
said he had tried to be included in a visit by a
Provincial Council Member to the Coalition facility at
Mosul Airfield three weeks earlier but was denied
entry. Task Force Freedom (TFF) told him to clear his
request for a visit with the Ninewa Provincial
Government, but he has yet to receive a response.

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Human Rights Committee Active
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9. (C) The Ninewah Provincial Council Human Rights
Committee is now actively following all of the
detention facilities and has good oversight of the
detention operations. Their engagement has
contributed to the government efforts to:

--transfer 384 prisoners awaiting trial from police
custody to the MRCF (relieve overcrowding in the
police jail)
--transfer 334 prisoners to the Transportation Jail to
await trial (relieve overcrowding in the police jail)
--send 100 prisoners to Baghdad to be tried there
(where legal capacity is better than Mosul)

In addition, MNF-NW is:

--conducting a detention training program to improve
quality of standards for detention
--meeting with Governor, Vice Governor and Police
Chief to remind all parties that the judgments of
Iraqi courts must be respected and the conditions of
detainment must be improved.

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Comment
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10. (C) Whatever the political agenda of the IOHR,
its representatives come across as credible and
qualified. Their allegations about the Wolf Brigade
are consistent with other reports received by TFF.
And to this date a mechanism has not been agreed to by
TFF, the IA, and the IP for granting NGOs access to
Iraqi detention facilities. Gaining access for NGOs
like IOHR to detention facilities would hopefully
establish a more rational basis from which to engage
human rights organizations. There is a determination
on the part of both the government and police to
improve the situation, but to reduce the overcrowding
(a main contributor to conditions leading to abuse)
they must have better support from the Minister of
Justice and an independent Iraqi judiciary to get
trials going. End comment.


11. (U) REOs Basrah, Hillah, Kirkuk and Mosul
minimize considered.


Jeffrey