Rep. Christopher Shays said the photographed abuse of Iraqi prisoners of war "They’re so horrible, they’re so degrading, and they fly in the face of everything that makes us American"
State lawmakers react to prison abuse in Iraq
By JOSEPH STRAW , Journal Register News Service
05/06/2004
WASHINGTON -- Members of Connecticut’s congressional delegation are joining colleagues in support of a full investigation of human rights abuses at U.S. military prisons in Iraq, with U.S. Sen. Dodd, D-Conn, suggesting that the issue could be the greatest threat yet to U.S. success in the war.
Legislators -- Republican and Democrat alike -- took issue not only with troops on the ground in Iraq, but with the highest echelon of Pentagon leadership.
U.S. Rep. Christopher Shays, R-4, who has visited Iraq five times since the U.S.-led invasion last March, said he can’t look at the pictures, one of which shows naked Iraqis piled atop one another as giddy U.S. troops pose nearby.
"They’re so horrible, they’re so degrading, and they fly in the face of everything that makes us American," Shays said. "Our mission is to free the Iraqi people from this kind of abuse."
Like other members of congress, Shays questioned why U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld withheld information about the abuse from Congress despite an internal Pentagon report on the issue, and a personal request from Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, that CBS News not run the story during the recent uprising in Fallujah.
"Secretary Rumsfeld is going to have to explain to us why we learned about this last week from the media," Shays said.
