US defence secretary Mr Donald Rumsfeld came under fire today from a high-level inquiry into the Abu Ghraib prison scandal but a US military judge ruled he did not have to testify at a trial arising from the abuse of Iraqi prisoners.
A four-member panel headed by former defence secretary Mr James Schlesinger issued a report accusing the chain of command from Mr Rumsfeld down of leadership failures that created conditions for the abuse late last year that sparked anti-American outrage across the world.
Mr Schlesinger described the situation at the US-run Baghdad prison as "'Animal House' on the night shift", a reference to a 1970s US film about riotous behavior at a student boarding house.
But he said it was clear that Mr Rumsfeld had issued no orders for the mistreatment of prisoners and direct responsibility ended with field commanders in Iraq.
"Command failures were compounded by poor advice provided by staff officers with responsibility for overseeing battlefield functions related to detention and interrogation operations," said the report, commissioned by Mr Rumsfeld in May.
"Military and civilian leaders at the Pentagon share this burden of responsibility."
Seven military police personnel have been charged so far in connection with the abuse at Abu Ghraib, which became public in April when photographs emerged of naked, hooded Iraqi prisoners being sexually humiliated and threatened with dogs.
Shortly after the scandal erupted President George W. Bush rejected calls for Mr
Rumsfeld's resignation, saying the defense secretary was doing a "superb job". Mr
Bush also described the abuse as the work of "a small number" of soldiers.
The Schlesinger panel however said in its report that 300 cases of abuses being investigated, many beyond Abu Ghraib. "So the abuses were not limited to a few individuals." He said there was "sadism" by some Americans at Abu Ghraib.
The report said an expanded list of more coercive techniques that Mr
Rumsfeld allowed for al Qaeda and Taliban suspects held in Guantanamo Bay "migrated to Afghanistan and Iraq, where they were neither limited nor safeguarded."
A senior Army official said that a separate investigation headed by Major General George Fay would fault Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez, at the time the top US commander in Iraq, for leadership failures for not addressing troubles at Abu Ghraib.
The Fay report, to be released tomorrow, found General Sanchez and his staff were preoccupied with combating an escalating insurgency and did not focus on the festering problems at Abu Ghraib, the Army official said.