Upstairs, Downstairs, Episode 231

Cover-up in Iraq: Shooting the messenger

David Miliband is criticised by a high-powered Commons committee today over claims that he "washed his hands" of alleged sexual abuse of Iraqi women at the British embassy in Baghdad.

The Foreign Affairs Select Committee demands to know why the Foreign Secretary had left an investigation into the claims to the same US firm that employed those accused of harassment. Amid claims that the firm's probe was inadequate, the MPs conducted their own 10-month investigation into allegations of a culture of sexual harassment and abuse at the British embassy inside the Green Zone in Baghdad.

The allegations, which are denied, were against British men working for KBR, the largest US contractor in Iraq.

An Iraqi female cleaner, backed by witness statements from two local cooks and a Canadian lawyer working at the embassy on behalf of the Department for International Development, came forward in June 2007 to say she had been asked to sleep with one of the KBR men in exchange for double pay. There were also allegations of some KBR staff "taking turns with female employees" and of threats of violence to anyone who tried to speak out.

In a hard-hitting report, the all-party committee rules: "We do not believe that it is appropriate in such circumstances for the investigation of complaints against contractors' staff to be entrusted solely to the contractors."

One witness to the alleged abuse accused Mr Miliband of a "cover-up" in his failure to launch a Foreign Office probe, despite two formal requests to intervene by the committee.