LONDON (Reuters) – Britain’s defence ministry said yesterday it was investigating fresh complaints that its  troops had abused prisoners in Iraq.

News of the probe came after the Independent newspaper  reported that Phil Shiner, a lawyer acting for detainees, had  catalogued 33 new cases of abuse since the 2003 invasion,  including rape and torture.

The paper reported that, for the first time, female soldiers  were accused of aiding in the sexual and physical abuse of  detainees.

Armed forces minister Bill Rammell said in a statement that  the claims were being taken seriously, but that formal  investigations needed to take place “without judgements being  made prematurely”.

He told the BBC that not all the cases were new and “that  about seven have come in within the last month”.

In one case, soldiers are accused of piling Iraqi prisoners  on top of each other and subjecting them to electric shocks, the  Independent reported.

The paper compared it to the abuse at the notorious US  detention centre at Baghdad’s Abu Ghraib prison.

One abuse claim relates to a 16-year-old boy who says he was  raped by two British soldiers while he was in custody in 2003.  Others say they were stripped naked, abused and photographed.

A public inquiry is already under way into the death of an  Iraqi civilian, Baha Mousa, who died in British custody in Basra  in 2003 after sustaining 93 separate injuries to his body.

Shiner, who is representing Mousa’s family, told the BBC he  believed “there are hundreds of cases that are going  uninvestigated.“

But the Ministry of Defence (MoD) said instances of abuse  were isolated cases.

“There is not any endemic evidence of abuse within the armed  forces, and that is in the context of 120,000 (troops), the  vast, vast, majority adhering to the highest standards of  behaviour,” defence minister Rammell told BBC television.

Shiner, conceded that claims still needed to be tested  against fact, but called for a public inquiry into all of them.