The military created a new category of reporting in June of 2005. In ‘‘unrestricted” reporting, the cases are handed over to law enforcement for investigation.

Under ‘‘restricted” reporting, victims receive medical help and counseling, evidence is collected but no investigation is started. There were 705 confidential or restricted reports, but 102 victims later changed their report to unrestricted.

Kaye Whitley, director, Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Center, said the department went to the restricted reporting because notifying commanders was a possible ‘‘barrier” to reporting and getting help for the victim.

‘‘The command is not notified who the individual is, although the command is notified if a sexual assault took place, and that person then gets all of the psychological care and medical assistance they need without an investigation,” she said.

Since the 2007 report was switched to coincide with the fiscal year 2007, it cannot be entirely compared with 2006, since one quarter of the 2006 calendar year is included in this year’s report.

Sixty percent of all reports concerned alleged rape and 72 percent of the victims were service members.

For the 603 ‘‘restricted” reports, 69 percent were alleged rape cases.

Action was taken against approximately half of the accused in the completed investigations. There were 181 courts martial, 201 non-judicial punishments and 218 administrative actions and discharges.

Some 75 percent of the reports were labeled unfounded or lacking in sufficient evidence.

The Army’s chief of public affairs, Maj. Gen. Anthony Cucolo, and Carolyn Collins, the program manager for the Army’s sexual assault and prevention response, met with the press after the report was released.

Cucolo said the Army senior leadership is concerned about the numbers.

‘‘We’re in about the fourth year of our program and we’ve built what we believe to be a solid culture of awareness and reporting,” he said. ‘‘They [senior leadership] don’t like the numbers, too high. They see a plateau.”

Cucolo said Army Chief of Staff, Gen. George Casey, has issued a directive to all commanders in the field to evaluate their prevention programs.

Collins said training and awareness of the problem is crucial at all levels from the schoolhouse to pre and post deployment.

The Army’s rate in the forward areas is actually lower than the Army-wide statistics. The sexual assaults reported in Central Command were 0.83 per thousand as opposed to 2.6 percent in the Army at large, Collins said.

The public affairs chief attributed the lower rates to strong unit cohesion in the combat zones, along with little free time and a lack of alcohol. Alcohol is a factor in 50 percent of all sexual assaults, all the speakers said.

Rachel Lipari, senior scientist, Defense Manpower Data Center, discussed the ‘‘2006 Workplace and Gender Relations Survey of Active Duty Members” after Whitey spoke.

Some 6.8 percent of women and 1.8 percent of men experienced unwanted sexual conduct according to the survey. Most service members report receiving training.

Overall 93 percent of women and 92 percent of men said they had training on sexual harassment in the previous year, Lipari said.