GENEVA, Switzerland, Sept. 22 (UPI) -- The United Nations special rapporteur on torture said Thursday that the situation in Iraq may be worse now than it was under Saddam Hussein.
Manfred Nowak, an Austrian law professor, said his opinion was based on reports of conditions in government-run detention centers and of torture by insurgents and militias, The Herald of Glasgow reported. The bodies in the Baghdad morgue often show signs of gruesome treatment.
Conditions in prisons run by the U.S. military and other coalition members appear to have improved since the Abu Ghraib scandal, he said.
Nowak, who was in Geneva for a meeting of the U.N. Human Rights Council, has not visited Iraq. He said he discussed a fact-finding mission with the Iraqi government in June but has not yet been invited to the country.
"The situation as far as torture is concerned in Iraq is now completely out of hand," Nowak said. "It is so bad that many people say that it is worse than in the times of Saddam."
