Execution video 'doctored'

PV Vivekanand

The infamous, revolting video showing the
decapitation of American Nicholas Berg by alleged Al
Qaeda members is a complete fraud and it was shot
inside the US-controlled Abu Ghraib prison outside
Baghdad. This is a contention put forward by experts
who made a frame-by-frame analysis of the footage.
The inference in the contention that the footage is
fraud is that the US military, reeling back from
allegations of gross abuse of Iraqi detainees by US
soldiers and interrogators under contract, wanted to
hit back by showing that Al Qaeda members were inhuman
executioners. The footage, which was put on an
Islamic website, drew worldwide condemnation of Al
Qaeda, and by inference Arab Muslims.
"The hastily released and shoddy video showing five
phoney Al queda members participating in the
decapitation of Nicholas Berg twas intended,
exclusively, to defray attention from the scandalous
sexual abuses of Iraqi PoW's that took place at the
Abu Ghraib prison outside Baghdad," says the
California-based La Voz de Aztlan, a news service.
"Evidence in fact shows that the Berg decapitation was
filmed inside the walls of the notorious Abu Ghraib
prison, this cursed dungeon where probably Satan
himself roams its corridors."
La Voz de Aztlan says many of its subscribers saw the
footage and raised doubts about its authenticity.
US intelligence officials have claimed that al Qaeda
assciated Abu Musab Al Zarqawi was the masked person
shown decapitating Berg with a large knife, but the
officials have not explained by the masked man did not
show any sign any handicap (whereas it is believed
that that Zarqawi lost one leg in an explosion).
According to La Voz de Aztlan, the features that
expose the footage as fraud are:
1. The white plastic chair in which Berg is shown
sitting in the video is identifical to the chair in
which an American female soldier is sitting with a US
Marine in fatigues standing behind her in one of the
infamous abuse photographs that came from Abu Ghraib.
The same chair is seen in at least four other
photographs that showed American abuse of Iraqi
detainees.
2. The orange prison overall that Berg is shown
wearing is exactly the same given by the US
authorities to prisoners taken in Afghanistan and
detained at Guatanamo Bay, Cuba.
There is no explanation why the same uniform was worn
by Berg if his captors and executioners were Al Qaeda.
3. Three of the five captors and executioners are
shown wearing bullet-proof vests that are of standard
US military supply. There has never been any
indication ever that Al Qaeda fighters anywhere in
the world ever used bullet-proof vests at all. And how
did they end up with American standard supply vests
which are not available in the market?
Furthermore, the one "Al Qaeda fighters" on the
extreme right in one of the video shots is pudgy and
is wearing very clean tennis shoes. This will not be
the case with an Al Qaeda fighter.
4. In one of the shots in the video showing Berg being
executed, a head wearing an American military cap of
the same type used by Abu Ghraib wardens is seen
poking into the right hand frame for a split second.
This could be seen only in slow motion review of the
footage. There cannot be any mistaking the similarity
between the Abu Ghraib cap and the cap seen on the
video. The man could be carrying a second video camera
as seen in slow motion.
5. The colour and texture of the wall as shown in the
frames taken from the video as shown in several
photographs of the Abu Ghraib abuse.,
The video footage of the "Berg execution" was uploaded
from London, England to a now defunct website in a
server located in Malaysia on May 11. Berg's body was
found near a highway bypass outside Baghdad on May 9.
According to La Voz la Aztlan, the website at
http://www.al-asnar.biz was shut down as soon as
"conservative news outlets like CNN and Fox News were
notified. These two news services wasted no time in
coming out with headlines like 'Islamic Terrorists
Decapitate an American in Iraq.' Within minutes, local
news services from New York to Los Angeles were
screaming 'Muslim Animals Chop Off the Head of an
American' and were showing only short segments of the
fake video. Pro-Zionist radio stations in Los Angeles
have spent literally days since then talking about the
Muslim barbarians and why it is so important to
support the war in Iraq. "
Additionally, Berg's family has said that they had
learnt that Berg, a former soldier who was trying to
sell a communication technology in Iraq, was in
American military custody at the time of his death.
His body was found outside Baghdad two days before
the videotape surfaced, but it was never explained the
body was decapitated.
"The real Nick Berg may or may not be dead, but the
heavily edited video is nothing but a fake," says La
Voz de Aztlan.
"For the time being, the mainstream media is totally
ignoring the above evidence," it says. "Hopefully soon
some brave mainstream publisher will dare to bring
this important information to the American people."

For related images, see
http://www.aztlan.net/berg_abu_ghraib_video.htm