WASHINGTON, June 12: The top US military commander in Iraq approved high-pressure tactics used on inmates at the infamous Abu Ghraib prison, The Washington Post said on Saturday.

Lt Gen Ricardo Sanchez approved letting senior officials at Abu Ghraib "use military dogs, temperature extremes, reversed sleep patterns, sensory deprivation and diets of bread and water on detainees whenever they wished", according to the Post, citing US government documents.

Gen Sanchez borrowed heavily from a list of interrogation tactics used at the detention centre at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, according to the Post.

In early September last year, Gen Sanchez authorized prison officials to use the pressure tactics without having to seek authorization from higher-ranking officials outside the prison.

However, military officials at the Tampa, Florida, headquarters of the US Central Command raised objections to 32 measures that Gen Sanchez had approved.

By October, those measures were ended, and prison officials were to obtain Gen Sanchez's direct approval to use the remaining authorized pressure tactics, the Post reported.

Gen Sanchez will be replaced by a four-star general - possibly Gen George Casey, vice chief of staff of the army - when the transitional Iraqi government takes office on June 30, Pentagon officials said last month.

Pentagon officials said earlier that Sanchez's future would likely be on hold until the investigations are completed, emphasizing it was not a matter of punishment but of command accountability.

650 TO BE FREED: Iraq's Coalition Provisional Authority is to release another 650 detainees from the Abu Ghraib prison on Monday, its deputy director of military operations said.

"The next detainee release from Abu Ghraib is scheduled for June 14 when 650 detainees are scheduled to be released," Brig Gen Mark Kimmitt said at a Baghdad news conference.

Over the past month, hundreds of detainees have already been set free from the facility at the centre of the US prisoner abuse scandal.

Nine busloads of prisoners left the jail, on the western outskirts of the Iraqi capital, on June 6, following another 13 busloads on May 28. A further 464 detainees were released on May 21.

US commanders first launched the policy of freeing low-threat prisoners early this year, as they faced overcrowding in detention centres.-AFP