US troops convert Saddam's torture chamber into their own
An elite US Special Operations forces unit has converted one of Saddam Hussein's former military bases near Baghdad into a top-secret detention centre and used one of the former Iraqi leader's torture chambers as its own interrogation cell, The New York Times reported late Saturday.
The newspaper said the chamber was named the Black Room.
In June 2004, Defence Undersecretary Stephen Cambone ordered his deputy, Lieutenant General William Boykin, to look into allegations of detainee abuse at Camp Nama, according to the report.
For all latest news, follow The Daily Star's Google News channel. The windowless, garage-size Black Room was used by some soldiers to beat prisoners with rifle butts, yell and spit in their faces and, in a nearby area, use detainees for target practice in a game of jailer paintball, The Times said.
Their intention was to extract information to help hunt down Iraq's most-wanted terrorist, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the paper pointed out, citing unnamed Defence Department personnel, who served with the unit or were briefed on its operations.
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