Military Misconduct

U.S. commanders moved swiftly to avert a crisis after a soldier deployed in Baghdad was found to have used a copy of the Koran for target practice. The incident had the potential to inflame Muslim opinion against the U.S. military and compromise the delicate alliance it has been forging with Sunni Arab communities against religious extremists. Local leaders accepted an apology from senior U.S.

Marine Sgt. Jermaine A. Nelson, jailed in Los Angeles last week for contempt of court for refusing to testify against his former squad leader about the alleged killing of Iraqi prisoners, was released Thursday after promising to attend a grand jury session and listen to questions. Joseph Low, Nelson's attorney, said his client promised U.S.

The Marine Corps on Wednesday said it was expelling one Marine and disciplining another for their roles in a video showing a Marine throwing a puppy off a cliff while on patrol in Iraq. The 17-second video posted on YouTube drew sharp condemnation from animal rights groups when it came to light in March. The clip shows two Marines joking before one hurls the puppy into a rocky gully. A yelping sound is heard as it flips through the air. "That's mean.

Eleven Brazilian soldiers were arrested on suspicion of turning over three shantytown residents to a Rio de Janeiro drug gang that executed them and left their bodies in a garbage dump, police said. The killings touched off anti-military protests Sunday and Monday in the Providencia shantytown, with residents burning city buses and throwing rocks at soldiers. Although the majority of the population supports an increased army presence in Rio de Janeiro's more than 600 poor, violent shantytowns, military leaders and politicians have warned that soldiers are not trained to do police work.

A Japanese court found a U.S. sailor guilty of stabbing two Japanese women near Tokyo last year and sentenced him to eight years in prison, officials said Thursday. Joshua David Williams, 20, was convicted of attempted murder in Yokohama District Court, court official Yoshie Ueki said. Williams, based at a large U.S. Navy facility in Yokosuka, just south of Tokyo, was accused of stabbing a 17-year-old girl and a 27-year-old woman in his off-base apartment in July 2007.

Federal prosecutors have dropped their bid to have two Marine sergeants jailed for contempt of court for refusing to testify against a former Marine squad leader who was acquitted last month in the killing of four unarmed Iraqi prisoners. In papers filed in Riverside federal court, prosecutors said dropping the charges against Sgt. Ryan Weemer and Sgt. Jermaine Nelson was "in the interests of justice." Despite reassurances from U.S.

At least six Air Force and two Army generals face potentially career-ending punishment in the mishandling of U.S. nuclear warhead components, Defense Department officials said. Military officials are expected to announce the disciplinary action today. At least two of the officers are three-star generals. "It is extensive and it is severe," a senior Defense Department official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because the punishment had not yet been announced.

The young girl stood at the podium in a cavernous federal courtroom in downtown Los Angeles, 8,000 miles and a world away from her native Phnom Penh, Cambodia. A prosecutor offered her a wooden footstool to stand on so she could better see the judge, but the girl declined. She eyed the defendant, who had done unspeakable things to her and six other girls. He was seated just a few feet away with a smirk on his face.

An American soldier pleaded guilty Thursday to charges of accessory to murder and was sentenced to eight months in prison for his role in the killing of four Iraqi prisoners who were bound, blindfolded, shot and dumped into a canal. Spc. Steven Ribordy, 25, of Salina, Kan., also will receive a bad conduct discharge as part of a plea deal. In addition, he agreed to testify against other members of his unit. "The execution of prisoners is arguably the greatest crime," prosecutor Capt.

The Colombian Defense Ministry fired 20 army officers Wednesday, including three generals, in connection with the deaths of a dozen youths who allegedly were killed and falsely identified as guerrillas slain in combat. The firings revolve around the disappearance over the last year of youths from Bogota's Soacha suburb, a sprawling working-class neighborhood rife with crime and unemployment.