International Committee of the Red Cross

The International Committee of the Red Cross is presented as an outside organization that repeatedly reported abuses in military prisons in Iraq to U.S. Army authorities before the Abu Ghraib scandal became public. Its ignored warnings establish that the authorities had received advance notice, complicating the account of the scandal as an isolated revelation.

Reports Before Public Exposure

In the months before the scandal broke, the International Committee of the Red Cross regularly sent reports about prison abuses to U.S. Army authorities in Iraq. The reports were systematically ignored. Their repeated delivery distinguishes prior institutional notice from a lack of information.

Role in the Scandal's Exposure

The account contrasts the ignored reports with the authorities’ later admission of the crime, which came only when media disclosure forced the issue into public view. The organization’s reports therefore anchor the argument that the abuses were known before they became a public scandal, rather than being discovered only afterward.