Fatal Torture of Inmates Suspected

Two detainees may have been tortured to death by Iraqi security forces, the head of a commission investigating allegations of abuse at Iraqi jails said Tuesday.

But the precise cause of their deaths was unclear, Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Rosh Shawais, who is heading the investigation, said in an interview.

Detainees told investigators that the two inmates were tortured or starved to death, but prison officials say the pair died of natural causes.

U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad told reporters Tuesday that in all, at least 120 prisoners had allegedly been abused by Iraqi security forces, more than previously disclosed by the government of Prime Minister Ibrahim Jafari. As many as 18 may have died at a Baghdad detention center that was first identified last month in a Los Angeles Times report.

Shawais, a Kurd, said he was continuing to investigate reports of other deaths.

The new allegations have surfaced at the end of a heated and sometimes violent political campaign leading to Thursday’s parliamentary vote. On Tuesday, Mizhar Dulaimi, a Sunni Muslim Arab candidate for parliament, was killed and a prominent Shiite candidate was targeted in an assassination attempt.

In addition, four U.S. soldiers died Tuesday after their patrol struck a roadside bomb northwest of the capital. Nearly 2,150 American service members have died in the Iraq conflict since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003.

Reports of prisoner abuse in Iraqi-run jails surfaced in November, after U.S. and Iraqi troops raided a compound in Baghdad’s Jadiriya section and found scores of men showing signs of hunger and torture.

Last week, officials discovered another detention center where at least 13 prisoners had apparently been physically abused. On Monday, a Sunni politician released a DVD purportedly showing tortured detainees at a third facility, but the allegation could not be confirmed.

Shawais has presented a report to the prime minister detailing preliminary findings regarding alleged torture at the first compound. He said his committee would finish its final report before the end of the year. He requested a deadline extension to widen the scope of the investigation.

The alleged abuse of Sunni Arabs at the hands of Shiite-dominated security forces has become intertwined with the fierce political campaign, which came to an official halt Tuesday to give voters a day to consider their choices.

A secular coalition led by former interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, which is running against the Shiite-led government, has asserted that the human rights environment in Iraq is now as bad as it was under former President Saddam Hussein.

At a luncheon organized for journalists Tuesday, Jafari vowed that his government would seriously look into the allegations. “We should provide prisoners with facilities that are up to international standards,” he said.

But he and his deputies also tried to minimize the issue, with one advisor arguing that Iraqis were far more concerned about bread-and-butter issues such as jobs, electricity and water service than they were about the prisoner abuse scandal. Jafari likened reports of torture and starvation to inmate abuse by American troops at Abu Ghraib prison. “It’s a matter of individuals,” he argued, “not the government.”

However, Khalilzad brushed aside some government officials’ attempts to downplay the torture accusations. “It was far worse than slapping around,” the ambassador said, calling on Iraqi leaders to speed up the investigation.

“We are very committed to looking at all the facilities,” he said. “It’s unacceptable for this kind of abuse to take place.”

Dulaimi, the Sunni politician, was gunned down Tuesday morning as he was driving with a relative in Ramadi in western Iraq. The relative was severely wounded.

The candidate was described as an active, dedicated political leader and Arab nationalist who took part in a recent conference in Cairo on Iraq’s future.

“Those who killed him are the enemies of Sunnis,” said Aboud Hamadi, a relative of the victim.

Jalaluddin Saghir, an outspoken Shiite cleric running with Jafari’s United Iraqi Alliance, was targeted in a failed assassination attempt on a road south of Baghdad, police said.

Several insurgent groups with ties to the Al Qaeda terrorist network have assailed the upcoming election as a “satanic project.” But other guerrilla groups closer to nationalist Sunni Arab tribal networks have urged Sunnis to vote. Members of the sect form the backbone of the insurgency against the U.S. military and the Shiite-led Iraqi government.

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Times staff writer Richard Boudreaux in Baghdad and special correspondents in Ramadi and Baqubah contributed to this report.