[JURIST] The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) [advocacy website] on Thursday filed a Freedom of Information Act request [text, PDF] demanding that the US Department of Defense publicly release its files about the deaths of 24 Iraqi civilians [JURIST report] last November in Haditha [JURIST news archive], Iraq. ACLU attorney Jameel Jaffer said in a press release [text] that the request was meant to "encourage an investigation that is credible and comprehensive." A DOD spokesman declined to comment on the request.

Meanwhile Thursday, the Los Angeles Times published parts of a report [JURIST report] concluding that although senior military officers missed several "red flags" that should have alerted them to inaccuracies in the original account of the civilian deaths in Haditha, there was no deliberate cover-up of the incident. The full report by Army Maj. Gen. Eldon Bargewell [Wikipedia profile] has not been made public yet. Reuters has more.