Telegraph : Iraqi police discover dozens of bodies bearing signs of torture

Iraqi police discover dozens of bodies bearing signs of torture

September 13, 2006

Police in Baghdad have found the bodies of at least 60 men scattered around the city in the past 24 hours. The bodies show signs of having been tortured before they were shot.

Security officials said the majority of the bodies were found in predominantly Sunni Arab neighborhoods in western parts of the capital.

The bodies were bound, bore signs of torture and had been shot, police said, adding that such killings are usually carried out by death squads operated by both Sunni and Shiite gangs.

Baghdad has been terrorised by violence since the war officially ended.

Last month 1,536 people were killed in Baghdad alone and throughout the city sections that were once mixed Sunni and Shia have experienced brutal sectarian cleansing.

Also today, the prosecutor in the genocide trial of Saddam Hussein, the ousted Iraqi leader, demanded that the chief judge resign, accusing the judge of being biased toward the former dictator.

The prosecutor, Munqith al-Faroon, said the judge, Abdullah al-Ameri, was too lenient in allowing Saddam to repeatedly make threats towards witnesses and other participants in the trial.