More Abu Ghraib Images

The ACLU has won a FoA lawsuit to get more photos of Abu Ghraib prisoner abuses released by the army.

Judge Alvin Hellerstein said the 144 pictures and videos can be turned over in edited form to protect the victims' identities. He gave the Army one month to release them.

The judge ordered the release after he viewed eight of the photos last week. They were given to the Army by a military policeman assigned to Abu Ghraib.

In October 2003, the ACLU filed a lawsuit seeking information on treatment of detainees in US custody and the transfer of prisoners to countries known to use torture. The ACLU contends that prisoner abuse is systemic.

"These images may be ugly and shocking ... (but) the American public deserves to know what is being done in our name," said Anthony Romero, executive director of the ACLU.

So far, 36,000 pages of documents and the reports of 130 investigations, mostly from the FBI and Army, have been turned over to the ACLU.

The group is seeking documents from the CIA and the Department of Defense as well.

The judge said last week that he believed photographs "are the best evidence the public can have of what occurred" at the prison.

Government lawyer Sean Lane had argued that releasing pictures, even in redacted form, would violate Geneva Convention rules by subjecting the detainees to additional humiliation.

I don't think that the release of the photos is the violation of the Geneva Convention rules, Mr Lane. I think that the torture of the prisoners is the violation of the Convention. It does little constructive use to try to pass the blame for these crimes to the ACLU for trying to bring public oversight into what has occured in Iraq.