A long-awaited US Army report has found 94 cases of abuse of prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan but blamed "a few individuals" and not the military leadership.
The report represented the army's official evaluation of prisoner detention and interrogation operations in the two countries that produced the physical and sexual abuse of Iraqi prisoners at the Abu Ghraib jail and at least three dozen deaths of detainees.
Lt. Gen. Paul Mikolashek, the Army's inspector general who conducted the report and appeared before the US Senate Armed Services Committe, described a series of shortcomings, including ambiguous policies and unclear responsibilities for troops.
But the report stated, "We were unable to identify system failures that resulted in incidents of abuse."
Democratic Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island
Democratic senators accused the army of failing to look for systematic problems.
"I don't think you've done the job that you have to do. Maybe you were told not to do it," Democratic Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island said.
The report cited 94 cases of "confirmed or possible" abuse of prisoners, including death, sexual assault, physical assault and theft, but concluded "we were unable to identify system failures that resulted in incidents of abuse."
Lt. Gen. Mikolashek said he found "no evidence" of so-called ghost detainees, prisoners kept off the books by US forces and hidden from the International Committee of the Red Cross.
But he said he was not disputing either Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba's report on Abu Ghraib that exposed and criticised the practice, or Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who said he ordered the secret detention of an Iraqi prisoner held for more than seven months without notifying the ICRC.
The army ordered the report in February, weeks after commanders learned of the physical and sexual abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib.