Queen's Lancashire Regiment - Abuses in Iraq

Abuses in Iraq

Some months after returning from Iraq the battalion was at the centre of the first serious accusations of abuse against Iraqi prisoners levelled at British soldiers. These accusations were illustrated on the front pages of the Daily Mirror by photographs which the Regiment immediately denounced as staged fakes. The Regiment then ran a successful campaign, believed to be unique for an active unit of the British Armed Forces, to prove that the pictures were false. After two weeks, the Mirror was forced to admit that it had found "sufficient evidence to suggest that these pictures are fakes and that the Daily Mirror has been the subject of a calculated and malicious hoax." Editor Piers Morgan was forced to resign when he refused to apologise. During the controversy, one senior officer of the Regiment was quoted as saying that "it is time to measure the ego of one tabloid editor against the lives of British soldiers (still serving in Iraq)" Another was reported by the BBC as saying 'this Regiment has taken on Louis XIV, Napoleon, the Kaiser and Hitler. I don't think Piers Morgan will detain us long'.

There has however been at least one case of true abuse; Corporal Donald Payne became Britain's first convicted war criminal after pleading guilty to abusing Iraqi detainees, which resulted in the death of one detainee Baha Mousa. Six other soldiers were cleared of any wrongdoing. The presiding judge, Mr Justice McKinnon, stated that "none of those soldiers has been charged with any offence, simply because there is no evidence against them as a result of a more or less obvious closing of ranks."