US military confirms five Koran mishandling incidents

A US military investigation has confirmed five Koran mishandling incidents by military personnel at the US naval base prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the Pentagon announced Friday.

An inquiry team led by Brigadier General Jay Hood, head of the detention facility at Guantanamo, identified 19 incidents involving Koran handling by military personnel at the facility, of which nine were suspected of involving "either intentional or unintentional mishandling of a Koran," Hood said in the statement.

Mishandling was defined as "touching, holding or the treatment of a Koran in a manner inconsistent with policy or procedure," he said.

Hood said the investigation, completed Thursday, had confirmed five of the nine alleged mishandling incidents, but could not determine if the four others actually happened.

Details about mishandling the Koran confirmed that a guard's urine came through an air vent and splashed on a detainee and his Koran, a soldier deliberately kicked the Muslim holy book and that an interrogator stepped on a Koran and was later fired for "a pattern of unacceptable behavior."

In other confirmed incidents, water balloons thrown by prison guards caused an unspecified number of Korans to get wet and a two- word obscenity was written in English on the inside cover of a Koran.

The inquiry was prompted by news reports that US military personnel at Guantanamo had flushed a Koran down a toilet to get the inmates to talk, but did not find any evidence to confirm its authenticity.

"The inquiry found no credible evidence that a member of the Joint Task Force at Guantanamo Bay ever flushed a Koran down a toilet," the statement said.

A Newsweek story in its issue dated May 9 reported that American military investigators had found evidence that interrogators at the Guantanamo prison facility had flushed a Koran down a toilet to get inmates there to talk.

The article, which was retracted by the magazine one week later, sparked violent protests in Afghanistan, where 16 were killed and more than 100 injured, Pakistan and other Muslim countries.

About 520 prisoners, most of whom were captured during the US- led war in Afghanistan, are still being held at Guantanamo Bay, and some of them have been detained there for more than three years without charges and access to lawyers.

Source: Xinhua