The top Democrat said it was time for Congress to launch a formal probe into the prison abuse scandals.

"It should happen," Kerry said. "It's a very legitimate inquiry. It's about who we are as a country, and these are terrible abuses."

"[The abuse allegations] are not good for fighting a war on terror," the top Democrat added.

Kerry said the GOP was to blame for the fact that scandals at Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib hadn't already been investigated by Congress.

"The reason is Republicans control the committees and they're protecting their own administration, it's very simple," he complained.

Kerry's call for a prison abuse probe followed comments to another Massachusetts newspaper, where the top Democrat promised to confront Congress with Britain's "Downing Street Memo" - a document anti-Bush extremists say contains impeachable evidence.

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