The only British soldier convicted of a war crime in Iraq alleged yesterday that his former commanding officer held a gun to a prisoner’s head and threatened “to blow his face off”.

Former Corporal Donald Payne, of the 1st Battalion The Queen’s Lancashire Regiment, was giving evidence for the first time at the public inquiry into the death of Baha Musa.

Mr Musa, 26, an hotel receptionist in Basra, died after suffering 93 injuries while held in custody at a British military centre in the southern Iraqi city in September 2003.

Payne claimed that all the soldiers in his unit enjoyed an “open season” of punching and kicking Mr Musa and other detainees.

Colonel Daoud Musa, Mr Musa’s father, who attended the hearing yesterday, emerged tearful from the morning session.

Payne, who was sent to prison for 12 months and dismissed from the Army after being convicted of inhumanely treating nine Iraqi civilians, including Mr Musa, arrested after an arms search spoke of his former commanding officer, Lieutenant-Colonel Jorge Mendonca, as trigger-happy and gung-ho.

Colonel Mendonca, a holder of the Distinguished Service Order, was one of five members of the Queen’s Lancashire Regiment and two from the Intelligence Corps who were charged in connection with the death of Mr Musa. The detainee was hooded and “plasticuffed” for 36 hours and forced to adopt a “stress position”, standing with his knees bent against a wall with his arms outstretched.

Colonel Mendonca was charged with negligently performing a duty for failing to prevent the mistreatment of Mr Musa and the other Iraqi prisoners. He was acquitted at a court martial in 2007. Although he was promoted to full colonel soon afterwards, he resigned his commission and left the Army. Five other defendants were also acquitted. Only Corporal Payne was convicted, although he was acquitted of the manslaughter of Mr Musa and of perverting the course of justice.

Payne described an occasion when he was travelling in a Land Rover patrol with Colonel Mendonca when someone shot a flare into the air. The Iraqi was arrested and the colonel started interrogating him.

“He asked how he got his weapon in. The prisoner did not reply and the CO then cocked his pistol and said he was going to blow his face off. He was holding the pistol above the man’s mouth. The prisoner said he was getting his weapons in through a taxi and we left him there on the floor and drove off,” Payne said.

“It was my impression that the CO was somewhat trigger-happy. He would pull his pistol out at any opportunity. He would behave as if he were a member of the SAS,” Payne said at the inquiry, headed by Sir William Gage, a retired judge. He claimed that Colonel Mendonca had shot at blacked-out windows in stationary cars because they were banned.

Tim Langdale, QC, Colonel Mendonca’s counsel, accused Payne of telling lies about his client.

Payne also alleged that the officer in command of his “multiple” (a patrol unit) — Lieutenant Craig Rodgers — had taken part in punching and kicking Iraqi detainees and had pretended to set alight an Iraqi boy who had been detained and whose head was covered by a hessian sack.

Payne admitted that he had previously lied when questioned by the Royal Military Police and had done so for his “self-preservation” and out of “misguided loyalty” to his former comrades. But yesterday he said he was telling the truth when he accused every member of his multiple of beating up the detainees.

“I have seen each one, including Lieutenant Rodgers, forcefully kick and/or punch the detainees in the period between September 14 and 16, 2003,” he said.

“Further, during the morning of September 15, I observed Lieutenant Rodgers place a jerry can of petrol in front of the young boy. He poured water over him and then lit a match. The young lad went hysterical,” he said.

Mr Rodgers, who left the Army in March 2007 having reached the rank of captain, strongly denied allegations of prisoner abuse when he gave evidence to the inquiry last week.

“I did not hit, punch, kick or physically assault any of the detainees at any time,” he said.

Payne told the inquiry that he had beaten up the detainees, including Mr Musa, because it was believed that they had murdered three members of the Royal Military Police a month earlier.

Asked by his lawyer whether there was anything he wanted to say to the detainees, Payne said: “I would just like to apologise for my appalling behaviour.”

The inquiry continues today.

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