By Felicity Arbuthnot
Global Research, January 12, 2014

A “devastating” two hundred and fifty page document: “The Responsibility of UK Officials for War Crimes Involving Systematic Detainee Abuse in Iraq from 2003-2008″, has been “presented to the International Criminal Court, and could result in some of Britain’s leading defence figures facing prosecution for “systematic” war crimes” the (London) Independent on Sunday has revealed.(i)

The dossier charges that: ‘ “those who bear the greatest responsibility” for alleged war crimes “include individuals at the highest levels” of the British Army and political system.’

Among those named, states the Independent, are two former Defence Ministry supremos, Geoff Hoon and Adam Ingram, Defence Secretary and Minister of State for the Armed Forces, respectively, under Tony Blair’s premiership, during the planning and invasion of Iraq and for most of the UK’s occupation. General Sir Peter Wall, head of the British Army is also named.

Shocking allegations have been compiled from the testimonies of four hundred Iraqis: ‘representing “thousands of allegations of mistreatment amounting to war crimes of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.” ‘

The document, lodged with the International Criminal Court at the Hague on Saturday (11th January 2013) “calls for an investigation into the alleged war crimes, under Article 15 of the Rome Statute” and is the result of some years of work by Birmingham based Public Interest Lawyers and the European Centre for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR.). The submission: “is the most detailed ever submitted to the ICC’s Office of the Prosecutor on war crimes allegedly committed by British forces in Iraq.”

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