TIKRIT, Iraq (AFP) - A military prosecutor branded four US soldiers who have been accused of murdering Iraqi prisoners "war criminals" and demanded they face court martial.
The prosecutor, Captain Joseph Mackey, was speaking on the last day of a legal hearing to determine whether there is enough evidence to prosecute the troops following the May 9 slaying of three detainees.
"US soldiers must follow the laws of war. That's what makes us better than the terrorists, what sets us apart from the thugs and the hitmen. These soldiers did just the opposite," Mackey said, in his closing argument.
The defendants, he charged, had cut the prisoners free of their plastic handcuffs and then "murdered them in cold blood", later falsely claiming that the victims had escaped and assaulted their captors.
"For this, they're not war heroes, they're war criminals, and justice states that they face trial," he concluded.
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