US soldier to serve no time for Iraq killings

Staff Sergeant Frank Wuterich was sentenced to 90 days confinement but he will not serve it for procedural reasons, the spokesman said.The sentencing hearing was held on Tuesday at Camp Pendleton, south of Los Angeles.Word of the maximum sentence led to outrage in Iraq, where Ali Badr, a Haditha resident and relative of one of the victims, called it "an insult to all Iraqis" and "solid proof that the Americans don't respect human rights". According to Al jazeera Iraqi authorities had pushed for those accused in the case to be subject to Iraqi justice before the final withdrawal of US troops in December last year. Wuterich, 31, the commander of a unit whose seven other members have been exonerated through various legal rulings, pleaded guilty on Monday to negligence, ending the final prosecution stemming from the 2005 incident. He entered his plea as part of a deal with military prosecutors in which more serious charges of involuntary manslaughter and aggravated assault were dismissed. (Al jazeera)