http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,81911,00.html
Arabic News Channel Shows Alleged U.S. Prisoners
Sunday, March 23, 2003
By Liza Porteus
Arabic news channel Al-Jazeera showed footage Sunday of what it said were five U.S. prisoners, including one woman.
The station showed footage of the alleged soldiers being questioned by their captors and being asked things such as where they were from and their names. The tape that was broadcast was reportedly provided by Iraqi television and was edited.
"This is the first we've seen of it -- it looks like Iraqi TV propaganda," said a U.S. Defense Department spokesperson. "What they're doing is wrong -- we're trying to get to the bottom of what we're seeing. We're investigating the tape now."
Three prisoners -- including the woman -- said they were from Texas, another was from New Jersey and another from Kansas.
"They shot at me first so I shot them … I wouldn't kill anybody … they don't bother me, I don't bother them," said the Kansas man. "I was told to come here," he said when asked why he came to Iraq.
One Texas man said: "I follow orders," when asked why he was there.
When asked how the Iraqi people have received him -- whether it be with "flowers or guns" -- the Texas man said "I don't understand … they're people of their own country."
In the interviews, two of the prisoners identified their unit only as the 507th Maintenance. The woman said she was 30 years old. She had no shoes on.
The station said the prisoners were captured around Nasiriyah.
Al-Jazeera also showed at least one prisoner lying on a cot, appearing to be wounded. Two prisoners were bandaged.
One of the male prisoners, sitting up, was being interviewed by an unseen person holding a microphone labeled "Iraqi TV." The soldier spoke in English and at one point said: "I'm sorry. I don't understand you."
The station also showed a gruesome and disturbing video of bodies in uniform in an Iraqi morgue that it said were Americans.
While an Iraqi smiled at the camera over the bodies and shifted them to better display the wounds, the tape showed what is purported to be U.S. Marines in U.S. military attire lying on the floor with serious head and torso wounds -- many execution style.
At one point, Iraqis pulled out what appears to be a passport and other papers out of one deceased person's pocket. Soldiers' shirts were pulled up, and pants pulled down, to show the extent of the wounds.
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, reacting to the video during an appearance on CBS' Face the Nation, said: "That's a violation of the Geneva Convention."
The convention prohibits photographing and humiliating captured troops.
Adopted in Aug. 12, 1949 by the Diplomatic Conference for the Establishment of International Conventions for the Protection of Victims of War, in Geneva, the agreement says prisoners of war must at all times be humanely treated. Any unlawful act -- including death or injury -- committed by detainees "will be regarded as a serious breach of the present Convention," according to the agreement.
POWs should not be subjected to physical mutilation or to medical or scientific experiments not justified by the medical, dental or hospital treatment. POWs "at all times be protected, particularly against acts of violence or intimidation and against insults and public curiosity," it states.
Defense officials said they were analyzing the video. They also said there is nothing in the tape that would lead them to believe the prisoners were not really U.S. troops.
"We will … get these men and women out of there -- there's no question in my mind," Fox News military analyst Maj. Gen Burton Moore said Sunday.
Referring to the tape showing the dead bodies, Moore said: "Make no mistake about it ... if in fact it is our people, the execution of these people is against the Geneva Convention."
"This is an outrage -- it's an outage to all Americans and it will continue to shore up our resolve" to win war," Moore continued. "This is Saddam Hussein through and through -- this is no surprise they would do this … this is still a terrible tragedy."
Fox News' David Lee Miller and Major Garrett and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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Yet some of you insist on supporting Saddam's cause..
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