UK-Iraq
Britain's Ministry of Defence (MoD) is expected to face a series of compensation claims for alleged abuse by its troops in Iraq after agreeing a record settlement of Pnds 2.8 million (Dlrs 5.5 m) over the killing of a Basra hotel worker.

Baha Musa died after suffering 93 injuries at a detention centre in Basra in 2003 in a case involving the alleged abuse and torture of eight other Iraqis held at the same time.

The five-year battle for compensation, agreed on Thursday, followed a number of crucial stages in which the MoD accepted liability.

In March it admitted "substantive breaches" of parts of the European Convention on Human Rights.

During the mediation process, Lieutenant-General Sir Freddie Viggers, the Adjutant-General who is in charge of army personnel, apologized "for the appalling treatment" suffered at the hands of the British Army.

The government has also agreed to hold an independent public inquiry into the incident, which is expected to start within the next few months although no date has been set.

The inquiry is to examine why the soldiers involved, and other senior figures in the British army, were apparently unaware that interrogation techniques, including hooding, subjection to noise, sleep and food deprivation, were banned.

In April, the British government agreed to pay Pnds 2 m, a record at the time, to an Iraqi teenager left paralysed when he was apparently accidentally shot in 2003 by a UK soldier at a camp in Basra.

Prior to this, the MoD had paid out an accumulative total of more than Pnds 3.3 m in compensation to Iraqi nationals abused by British troops since the 2003 invasion, over half in the last 12 months.

Previously the payments had declined from Pnds 753,000 in the first year of the war, to Pnds 331,000 in 2004/05 and just Pnds 98,000 in 2005/06.