FBI Documents and Other Reports
The Newsweek article and the ensuing controversy turned the spotlight on other reports of Qu'ran desecration and spurred additional investigations by others. After a verdict by a federal court on May 25, 2005, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) obtained documents from the FBI interrogations of Guantánamo Bay detainees dating back to August 2002. The documents stated that some detainees had claimed to have witnessed Quran desecration (including "flush a Quran in the toilet"), among other acts, on many occasions by their guards — in a document dated August 1, 2002. The pertinent excerpt reads as follows:
"rior to his capture, had no information against the United States. Personally, he has nothing against the United States. The guards in the detention facility do not treat him well. Their behavior is bad. About five months ago, the guards beat the detainees. They flushed a Koran in the toilet. The guards dance around when the detainees are trying to pray. The guards still do these things."
The ruling of the court forcing the release of this and other documents came under the Freedom of Information Act
The ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero said, in a news release, that "The United States government continues to turn a blind eye to mounting evidence of widespread abuse of detainees held in its custody."
The FBI declared that it could not investigate the matter, as it was up to the Defense Department to do so. For its part, the Pentagon, through its spokesman Lawrence Di Rita, appeared to have transitioned from flat denials to vagueness and unsettled syntax: "There have been instances, and we'll have more to say about it as we learn more, but where a Quran may have fallen to the floor in the course of searching a cell." Scott McClellan, the White House press secretary, told reporters that "past accusations have had credibility issues."
James Jaffer, an attorney working for the ACLU, was quoted by the New York Times as stating that errors in the Newsweek story had been used to discredit other investigative efforts conducted by his organization and other groups "that were not based on anonymous sources, but government documents, reports written by FBI agents."
Many questioned the veracity of such accounts, noting that the FBI, in 2004, had released a captured Al-Qaeda training manual which Bush Presidency spokesmen claim shows that Al-Qaeda members are trained to make false accusations once captured.
Read more about this topic: 2005 Quran Desecration Controversy
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