"The release came after massive protests organized by the Islamic Party and the Islamic organization for human rights over the past three days," Nour Al-Din Al-Hayalli, the Islamic Party's media officer in Mosul, told IslamOnline.net.

The Islamic party championed a massive demonstration following the Friday prayers on June 17 to press for the immediate release of all Iraqi women in the US custody.

Assembling outside the Sedek Rashan mosque, protestors denounced the American occupation for dishonoring the Iraqi people by detaining women.

They carried photos of detained women, demanding the government of Ibrahim Jaafari to live up to its responsibilities toward the Iraqi people.

The demonstrators also issued a statement calling for an immediate release of all Iraqi women detainees across the occupied country.

There is no available figures on Iraqi women in the custody of American occupation forces, including former regime officials and scientists.

Bargain Chip

Al-Hayalli said many Iraqi families have complained that the occupation forces were holding women as a bargain chip against relatives reportedly involved in resistance operations.

In a demonstration staged on Thursday, June 16, an Iraqi woman said her daughter-in-law was detained by US soldiers after they failed to find her husband.

"They stormed the house on May 24, searching for my son. When they failed to find him they detained his wife and threw his six-month-old child to the ground," she recalled.

Another Iraqi female detainee, who was released days earlier, recounted her own nightmare.

"The US forces attacked the house after midnight, blowing up the doors and killing my husband's brother and injuring me along with my husband and brother."

"They arrested me along with my husband and brother. We suffered horrible detention conditions."

Abuses

Harith Adeb, the head of the Islamic organization for human rights, said his group registered 21 cases of Iraqi women detained by the American occupation forces across the city.

"Five women, all of the same family, were detained in western Mosul, two in Al-Nour district and another from Mosul University in addition to others released few days ago," he said.

Abdeb lambasted American abuses of Iraqi women including open-ended detention without charges.

Amnesty International said in a report last month that several women detained by US troops had complained of beatings, threats of rape, humiliating treatment and long periods of solitary confinement.

Britain’s mass-circulation The Guardian revealed in May, 2004, that US soldiers in Iraq have sexually humiliated and abused several Iraqi female detainees in Abu Ghraib.

In its May 10-17 issue of the same year, Newsweek said that unreleased Abu Ghraib abuse photos include an American soldier raping a female Iraqi detainee.