*IRAQ: latest news and developments

[Barking_Mad]

Jack Straw says the UK are 'not occupiers'. Funny that as Paul Bremer said exactly the opposite. Chances of the media picking this up? None I suppose.

“As long as we're here, we are the occupying power. It's a very ugly word, but it's true.” - Paul Bremer, Special Envoy to Iraq.” – Washington Post Interview – 18th June 2003

 

[bigfish]

Ted Lang: Iraq: Sanatized Slaughter: Where are the mainstream media accounts of these atrocities?

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article6983.htm


There are now two Iraq wars: the first is being fought with helicopter gunships and cluster bombs along the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates; the second is being fought here in Britain and in the pre-election US. This is a propaganda war in which the hundreds of Iraqis killed every week by US bombardment fail to make the headlines, while the horrifying images provided by a Jordanian kidnapper and killer of British and US contractors is portrayed as the true face of Iraqi resistance.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article6984.htm


GI SPECIAL: 16,000 U.S. Casualties At Landstuhl: The Troops: Burned, Blinded, Or Sparring With Death: The Staff? "George Bush Is An Idiot" (PDF) 28/9/04

http://www.williambowles.info/gispecial/gi_2b75.pdf


Continued U.S. Airstrikes in Baghdad Draw Criticism: Interim president of Iraq likens the tactics to Israeli military actions in the Gaza Strip: President Ghazi Ajil Yawer said the U.S. strikes were viewed by the Iraqi people as "collective punishment" against towns and neighborhoods.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article6981.htm


Allawi Couldn't Have Said It Any Better Himself : It's a political whodunit: Since Ayad Allawi delivered his address to a joint meeting of Congress on Thursday, foreign policy devotees have been searching for the ghostwriter of the speech, which sounded curiously familiar to American ears.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article6988.htm


Lawmaker expresses "dismay" that White House allegedly wrote Allawi speech: "I want to express my profound dismay about reports that officials from your administration and your reelection campaign were 'heavily involved' in writing parts of Prime Minister Ayad Allawi's speech," California Senator Dianne Feinstein wrote in a letter to President George W. Bush.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article6987.htm

Letters

Blair's sorry spectacle


Thursday September 30, 2004
The Guardian

Tony Blair's words about Iraq were a carefully crafted piece of concealment, collusively endorsed by his lieutenants (Blair refuses to say sorry, September 29). He was right to say that he couldn't sincerely apologise for doing something he thought was right. He had, we must suppose, good moral reasons for seeking to pursue that course of action. But he couldn't secure his favoured end without the consent of others.

What many of us want him to apologise for is not the moral stance that led him to the decision to act with Bush, but the dubious means by which he secured that consent in the Commons, appealing to considerations that had nothing to do with the concealed moral grounds of his own decision.
Michael McGhee
Department of Philosophy, University of Liverpool

So Tony Blair's speech was "low-key, conversational and reasoned" (Leader, September 29). And his "apology" on Iraq was a "rightly well-received milestone in his fragile rehabilitation with his critics".

No matter that he abused the intelligence on WMD, overrode security warnings about unleashing more terrorist attacks, and deceived the country over the"threat" posed by Iraq. No matter that he then launched an illegal and immoral invasion that has led to tens of thousands of deaths, a further destabilised Middle East, a weakened UN, and increased the threat to Britons everywhere.

Even a kindly, if myopic, critic might conclude that Blair's political judgment on Iraq and in supporting Bush was sufficiently bad to demand his resignation. A more dispassionate critic might well go further: that Blair ought to be tried for war crimes. As for the Guardian? Well, clearly, you'd rather remain part of some agreement between reasonable gentlemen of the establishment. Future historians will note your dishonourable role in propping up Blair.
Dr David Cromwell
Southampton

http://www.guardian.co.uk/letters/story/0,3604,1315823,00.html

 

[Barking_Mad]

94 said to be dead - 21 of those civilians.

U.S. forces kill 94 in Iraqi town

SAMARRA, Iraq (Reuters) - U.S.-led forces have stormed Samarra and said nearly 100 guerrillas were killed in air strikes and street-to-street combat during a major new American offensive to wrest control of the Iraqi town.

Doctors at Samarra's hospital said on Friday 47 bodies were brought in and at least 21 of those were of civilians, including women and children. They said ambulances could not reach many wounded as fighting, which lasted throughout the night, was still going on. A spokesman for the U.S. 1st Infantry Division said an estimated 94 insurgents were killed.

Troops backed by tanks pushed slowly through the streets as guerrillas unleashed mortar attacks and fired rocket-propelled grenades and rifles from the rooftops. As the fighting continued past midday, residents found electricity and water cut off.

The U.S. military says it will retake control of guerrilla strongholds like Samarra, the western cities of Falluja and Ramadi and the Baghdad districts of Sadr City and Haifa Street by the end of the year so elections can go ahead in January. The Samarra assault began shortly after midnight with air strikes and artillery barrages pounding the mainly Sunni Muslim town, which had been a no-go zone for U.S. forces for months.

The U.S. military said three U.S. soldiers were wounded during the operation in the town, 100 km (60 miles) north of Baghdad. It said troops destroyed several mortar sites, rocket-propelled grenade teams and guerrilla vehicles. Guerrillas were seen unloading weapons and ammunition from two speedboats on the Tigris River in the town, the military said. Troops opened fire and destroyed the boats.Some of the fighting raged close to a mosque that attracts many Shi'ite Muslim pilgrims to the predominantly Sunni region.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Iraq water treatment plants to go online

BAGHDAD — Until this summer, most of Baghdad's wastewater was being dumped directly into the Tigris River, the main water supply fopr the capital's 4.7 million people.

"We have killed the Tigris," says Ali Labeeb, an official with Baghdad's public works department. And the Tigris has been killing Baghdadis. At least five died from water-borne illness over the summer.

Now, after 12 years without sewage treatment, the capital's plants will be soon be in operation — a big step toward addressing health problems caused by contaminated water.

 

[Barking_Mad]

An Iraqi man cries over the body of his dead son at the Yarmouk hospital in Baghdad. The young boy was killed during recent car bombings.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Oh dear - you have to wonder how many Iraqi policemen are actually insurgents. If the US need lots of police in a hurry then whose to say they are going to check everyone thoroughly?

Police-station cache worries U.S. soldiers

Baghdad, Iraq- When U.S. soldiers discovered a huge stash of guns, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades here recently, it wasn't the size of the cache that surprised them. Rather, it was the location they found unnerving. The weapons were discovered at an Iraqi police station across the street from the American unit's own headquarters, Patrol Base Volunteer. The soldiers, members of the Oregon Army National Guard's 2nd Battalion, 162nd Infantry, wondered why police officers would need explosives and weapons typically associated with the insurgents who fight against U.S.-led forces.

The Guardsmen confiscated the stockpile, but days later, the weaponry is still the subject of debate and speculation. One thing is certain: The discovery has stirred feelings of unease among soldiers.

"You don't know who to trust," said Staff Sgt. James Way, 33, of Portland, Ore.

What to do with the confiscated weapons and explosives remains to be determined. Way and several other soldiers said they don't like the thought of returning the rocket-propelled grenades and mortars to the Iraqi police - even though they are supposed to be allies in the battle with insurgents.

"If we give the cops [back] this stuff, it's going to be shot at us," Way said.

It's a lot of "stuff." The cache included more than 100 rocket- propelled grenades and three dozen launchers, nearly 100 mortar rounds, and hundreds of machine guns and rifles.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Not made many major headlines mainly because the media are too bothered about Bush and Kerry and poor old Tony and his dodgy ticker....fuck me.

At least 90 killed, 180 wounded in Iraq operation

At least 90 people were killed and 180 wounded today as US troops and Iraqi forces charged into Samarra in a first effort to reclaim troublespots before Iraq's planned elections. The Samarra operation, 125 kilometres north of Baghdad, started before dawn, with the US military saying 2,500 US troops and 1,000 Iraqi forces had seized the city hall and police stations.

It followed vows by the interim government to win back swathes of lawless territory in the Sunni Muslim triangle before November to prepare for the January poll. "In response to repeated and unprovoked attacks by anti-Iraqi forces (US military terminology for insurgents), Iraqi Security Forces and Multi-National Forces secured the government and police buildings in Samarra," the military said.

A military spokesman said 94 insurgents were killed, while three US soldiers were wounded.Dr Khaled Ahmed at Samarra's main hospital said 90 people were killed and 180 hurt.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Over the last two days I make it that -

188 Iraqis have died and 394 Iraqis have been injured in all kinds of killings.

In comparison September claimed 87 occupation troops lives with 616 injured (up until the 28th September) This made September the 3rd most deadly month since the end of the initial invasion.

 

[Barking_Mad]

It seems that thousands of people are fleeign Samarra as the fighting continues - US murdering and butchering Iraqis by the dozens as the world barely manages to watch. Dear god.

Thousands of people were fleeing the historic town, 100 km (60 miles) north of Baghdad. Water and electricity were cut off.

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/041001/325/f3q8z.html

 

[Gumbert]

as the world barely manages to watch. Dear god.

heard snippets on the radio, termed "Massive Force"....

fuckin grim

 

[bigfish]

10/01/04: More Than 100 Killed As U.S. Forces Storm Iraqi Town: Doctors at Samarra's hospital said 47 bodies were brought in, including 11 women, five children and seven old men. Staff could cope with no more wounded and bodies lay in the streets.

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/041001/325/f3q8z.html


Hospital says 12 killed in U-S attacks on Sadr City : Iraq An Iraqi hospital director says 12 Iraqis are dead and eleven wounded after a U-S strike on Baghdad's Sadr City neighborhood.

http://www.wtvo.com/Global/story.asp?S=2374253


7 Killed And 13 Wounded after U.S. Raid over Fallujah: Representatives of the hospital in the city have announced that there are children among the casualties.

http://www.focus-fen.net/index.php?catid=138&newsid=48940&ch=0&datte=2004-10-02

Freed Italian backs Iraqi resistance: An Italian aid worker in Iraq held captive and subsequently freed has said guerrillas there were right to fight US-led forces and their Iraqi "puppet government".

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/487181C1-5560-4188-88B2-545CF869D625.htm


From Baghdad: A Wall Street Journal Reporter's E-Mail to Friends. The genie of terrorism, chaos and mayhem has been unleashed onto this country as a result of American mistakes and it can't be put back into a bottle.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article6999.htm


WSJ Backs Iraq Screed: Wall Street Journal Editor Paul Steiger has come to the defense of his beleaguered Baghdad correspondent, who blasted the war in Iraq as a "disaster" that has deteriorated "into a raging barbaric guerilla war" that will haunt the United States for decades.

http://www.nypost.com/business/19818.htm


Eternal Darkness of the American Mind: Our government is as much a terrorist as those in Beslam, Bali, New York and Madrid. It is time we stop thinking ourselves the enlightened culture we are not. It is time to stop a hypocrisy that seems to validate the atrocities we commit while castigating those made against us.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article6997.htm

 

[Barking_Mad]

Civilians bear brunt as Samarra 'pacified'

Iraqi government and US forces declared yesterday that they had "pacified" the rebel stronghold of Samarra, and stated that other "no-go" enclaves such as Fallujah would be recaptured before national elections due in January. The Americans insisted that the estimated 125 people killed in the storming of the city were all insurgents. Doctors and local people reported women, children and the elderly among the dead, and that bodies were still being brought into hospitals.

There also appeared to have been discord over the military action between members of the US-sponsored Iraqi interim government. The Interior Minister, Falah Naqib, echoed the American line that no civilians had been killed and only "bad guys and terrorists" had suffered. It was, he said, a "great day for Samarra". But the Human Rights Ministry, in a letter to the Iraqi Red Crescent, described what happened in the city as a "tragedy" and called for urgent emergency assistance. Local people in Samarra claimed that many of the 1,000 insurgents the Americans were targeting had escaped before the attack, and civilians had borne the brunt of the casualties. Of 70 bodies brought into Samarra General Hospital, 23 were children and 18 women, said Abdul-Nasser Hamed Yassin, a hospital administrator. There were also 23 women among the 160 wounded.

Families trying to bury the dead found the road to the cemetery had been blocked by American soldiers. One man, Abu Qa'qa, claimed he had seen dogs picking at corpses in the street. Abdel Latif Hadi, 45, said: "The people who were hurt most are normal people who have nothing to do with anything." Another resident, Mohammed Ali Amin, said: "There were American snipers on rooftops who were shooting people trying to get to their homes. Even at the hospital the Americans arrested injured boys of 15 saying they were insurgents." CNN television was told by one man that his sister-in-law and her six daughters were killed when the vehicle they were travelling in was hit by an US air strike. Aid organisations said there was acute concern about continuing lack of water and electricity in Samarra and the difficulties faced by people attempting to seek medical treatment. More than 500 families had fled the city.......

......US forces have also been attacking Sadr City, a vast slum and a "no-go" area on the edge of Baghdad, with helicopter gunships and tanks; 12 people were killed in the past 48 hours. In Ramadi, US soldiers are said to have killed a woman bystander after being ambushed.

US warplanes pound Fallujah

SAMARRA — Residents of the Iraqi city of Samarra collected the bodies of their relatives yesterday, two days after a massive US-Iraqi operation to root out rebels, as US warplanes pounded Fallujah for a third time in just over 24 hours killing at least two people. The stench of decomposing bodies filled the corridors of Samarra’s hospital as staff wearing surgical masks lifted corpses out of the building one after the other, shouting out names as they reached the front doors, where families waited. At least 150 people died and scores were wounded in the two-day joint offensive against Samarra, a predominantly Sunni city north of Baghdad that had been in the grip of rebels since June.

A US military commander said yesterday he estimated that 10 per cent of the dead were civilians while local hospital officials said that per centage may be much higher. Ambulances guarded by US military vehicles were going around Samarra to collect the bodies of the dead, while Iraqi national guardsmen roamed the streets in pickup trucks or stood at intersections. Many buildings in the city’s commercial district were either riddled with bullets or partially destroyed, the streets littered with burnt out vehicles.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Iraqi dead from 30th September - 4th October (12pm)

251 Iraqi dead
533 Iraqi injured

(rough totals only)

 

[Barking_Mad]

Daily mine injuries in Iraq surpass 300

BAGHDAD, Oct. 3 (Xinhuanet) -- More than 300 Iraqis were injured everyday by mines, bombs, and explosions across the country, Al Taakhi newspaper quoted a planning ministry official as saying on Sunday. The statistics were based on trial survey made on injuries caused by explosions and bombs, which showed that more than 300 persons were injured everyday, most of them were children, the official said.

The source pointed out that the mine injuries in Iraq were one of the highest in the world, and thousands of mines which were not defused threatened the lives of Iraqi people.There were also unexploded bombs thrown by American airplanes during the Iraq war across the country.

Poland to pull troops from Iraq by end of 2005: defence minister

WARSAW: Poland will pull its troops out of Iraq by the end of 2005, when UN resolution 1546 endorsing the timetable for political transition in Iraq expires, Defense Minister Jerzy Szmajdzinski says. "The final date (of our military presence in Iraq) should be that of the expiry of the UN Security Council resolution," in December 2005, the minister said in an interview with Polish public radio.

His comments marked the first time a Polish official has set a precise timetable concerning the withdrawal of Polish troops from Iraq. Until now the Polish government had said it would reduce its military presence in Iraq in 2005. Poland sent 2,500 troops to Iraq last year in the wake of the US-led invasion and heads up a multinational division of 6,000 soldiers, including 2,500 Poles, in south-central Iraq. But amid strong popular opposition to the Polish troop deployment and violent unrest in the embattled country, the government in Warsaw is under domestic pressure to bring to an end Poland's military involvement in Iraq.

Seventeen Polish nationals have died in Iraq -- 13 soldiers and four civilians -- including three soldiers killed in an attack last month near the central Iraqi city of Hilla. According to the latest poll, more than 70 percent of Poles are opposed to the presence of their country's troops in Iraq.

 

[jigoku]

jigoku

Drfranni - what's wrong with painting scuds green & yellow?

it really dose not matter what colour leathal weapons are, you wont be taking notes on colour coordination when its up yer jacksie.

 

[bigfish]

Civilians bear brunt as Samarra 'pacified': Of 70 bodies brought into Samarra General Hospital, 23 were children and 18 women, said Abdul-Nasser Hamed Yassin, a hospital administrator.

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=568511


Samarra locals' fury at US raids: Residents voiced their anger at the number of civilians killed, including women and children, and the lack of water and electricity.

http://www.theherald.co.uk/news/25269.html


Iraqi Girl Blog: Samarra Burning...: It's like a nightmare within a nightmare, seeing the corpses pile up and watching people drag their loved ones from under the bricks and steel of what was once a home.

http://riverbendblog.blogspot.com/2004_10_01_riverbendblog_archive.html#109682317800277775


'I saw dogs eating the body of a woman': The US strategy of "precision strikes" came in for criticism from Iraqi President Ghazi Yawar, who described the air assaults as collective punishment.

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?sf=2813&click_id=2813&art_id=vn20041004024359961C360203&set_id=6


This is a Massacre, Not a War in Iraq: Woe unto us for allowing the madman Bush to kill people in Iraq, Afghanistan and by proxy, in Palestine. Some day, as Malcolm X prophesied, "The chickens will come home to roost."

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article7014.htm


A Shiite-Sunni Islamist 'high command' may be forming: There are ominous signs that, far from dying down, the conflicts in the Middle East are set to widen in the coming months, sucking in new actors and posing new threats to the United States and its allies.

http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=5&article_id=8957


Video: Dance of Death: Soldiers and their families speak out against the war.: Lambs led to slaughter or centurions for the Empire?

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/video1010.htm

 

[Barking_Mad]

Iraqi resistance fighters deliver ultimatum to US

BEIRUT, October 4 (Itar-Tass) - Iraqi resistance fighters on Monday presented the U.S. Military Command with an ultimatum demanding pulling out of American troops from Falluja, Samarra and the Shiite districts of Najaf and Madinat-Sadr (Baghdad suburb with a population of two million). In a statement of the United Command of Mujahiddeen (fighters for faith) circulated in the Internet it is stressed that the coalition troops should quit the named cities, as well as the Luteifya area south of Baghdad, Tal-Afar city in the north of the country and Saada village on the Syrian-Iraqi border by Saturday.

Otherwise the militants are threatening with carrying out large-scale subversive actions throughout the country, in particular, they have threatened to “attack oil pipelines in all provinces, interrupt transport communication with Turkey, Syria and Jordan in order to block the traffic of goods across the border for the exception of foodstuffs.” Iraqi Defence Minister Hazem al-Shaalan said on Sunday that the military operation in Samarra has ended in “total victory.” According to him, the Iraqi state troopers and patrols of the coalition forces are controlling 70 percent of the territory of the city located 50 kilometres north of Baghdad. In the meantime, the League of Islamic Theologians of Iraq – the union of spiritual leaders of Sunni Muslims has called the events in Samarra and Falluija a “massacre.”

 

[Barking_Mad]

Iraq Survey Group to concede defeat in search for WMD

The Iraq Survey Group is expected to report today that it has found no evidence of chemical, biological or nuclear weapons in post-war Iraq. (Mr Duelfer) is expected to conclude that Iraq had neither weapons of mass destruction, nor significant WMD production programmes at the time of the invasion. However, he will assert that Saddam Hussein had plans to produce weapons once UN sanctions were lifted, according to US officials.

The verdict of Mr Duelfer, who will present the findings to the Senate Armed Services Committee, has been widely anticipated since the resignation of David Kay, the former head of the Iraq Survey Group, in January. When he stepped down, Mr Kay voiced serious concerns about allegations of weapons stockpiles. "We were probably all wrong about whether Iraq had stockpiles of nuclear, chemical or biological weapons," he said.

There were claims last night that the report would reveal new evidence that Saddam had planned to break UN-imposed sanctions and renew the production of banned weapons. Anonymous US officials told The New York Times that the report would detail efforts by Iraq to sidestep the sanctions while undermining international support for them. This was reportedly manifested in the use of clandestine laboratories to manufacture small amounts of chemical and biological weapons for use in assassinations, according to the officials. Today's document will stop short of offering a final judgement about the situation before the war. The Iraq Survey Group is expected to continue translating and evaluating an estimated 10,000 boxes of documents seized in Iraq.

About 6,000 prisoners held in two Iraqi jails without trial manure factories which caused diseases among the detainees, said Adhadh

BAGHDAD, Oct. 6 (Xinhuanet) -- About 6,000 Iraqis and other Arab nationalities were being held without trial in both Abu Ghoraib prison, west of Baghdad, and Pokka prison in Basra, 600 km south of Baghdad, local newspaper Al Mashriq reported Wednesday.

The health committee of the Iraqi National Council and the legal committee of the Iraqi Ministry of Human Rights visited the two prisons and found that all the detainees there were not tried or even charged with any allegation and most of them were arrested illegally, according to the report.

"Among the detainees are teenagers less than 14 years old as well as elders over 60," Ryadh Al Adhadh, head of the health and environment committee of the council, was quoted as saying."Fathers together with their sons were arrested and the handicapped including the blind were also imprisoned with no charge," Adhadh added. He also noted that 56 detainees held in the two prisons were from other Arab countries, including Syria, Egypt, Libya, Sudan and Iran

 

[Gumbert]

honest about lying?

US: Iraq was free of WMDs

Contradicting the main argument for a war that has cost the lives of more than 15,000 Iraqis and over 1000 US soldiers, the US' top weapons inspector declared today that Iraq was free of WMDs before last year's invasion.

In a report presented to Congress on Wednesday, Charles Duelfer, head of the Iraq Survey Group appointed by George Bush to hunt for Iraqi WMDs, said Iraq had no stockpiles of biological and chemical weapons and its nuclear programme had decayed since the 1991 Gulf War.

The conclusions flew in the face of statements made by the US president before the invasion. Bush cited a growing threat from Iraq's weapons of mass destruction as the reason for overthrowing former President Saddam Hussein.

Speaking earlier in the day in testimony prepared for the Senate Armed Services Committee on Wednesday Duelfer said: "I still do not expect that militarily significant WMD stocks are cached in Iraq,"

He said Iraq's nuclear weapons programme had deteriorated singificantly since the 1991 Gulf War.

The issue has figured prominently in the campaign for the US presidential election, with Bush's Democratic opponent John Kerry saying Bush rushed to war without allowing UN inspections enough time to check out Iraq's armaments.

Bush, who has given varying justifications for the war, said in a speech in Pennsylvania on Wednesday that the concern was that terrorists would get banned weapons from Saddam.

"There was a risk, a real risk, that Saddam Hussein would pass weapons or materials or information to terrorist networks," Bush said.

"In the world after September 11, that was a risk we could not afford to take," he said, referring to the 2001 attacks on the United States attributed to al-Qaida.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/ECF3A8C1-789B-44DA-AA85-3C8D65DF34B7.htm

 

[Barking_Mad]

Iraqi killed in US attack as blast rocks 'Green Zone'

U.S. warplanes attacked Baghdad's Sadr City district overnight to "neutralize roadside bombs" that regularly explode as American patrols drive through the area, the US military said Thursday.

AC-130 gunships fired into the district's streets, which are littered with improvised bombs, said Capt. Brian O'Malley of the 1st Cavalry Division. According to The AP, residents held a funeral Thursday for a man they said was killed in the strikes.

Also in Baghdad, U.S. authorities raised the security alert in the Green Zone after an improvised bomb was found in front of a restaurant there, officials said Thursday. Later, a huge blast rocked the Zone, which houses major U.S. and Iraqi government offices. There were no reports on casualties.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Zarqawi claims two planes downed

THE US military said today it had lost track of a small, unmanned surveillance plane over Baghdad as Islamic militant Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi's group claimed it shot down two such drones. "One of our UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles), we have lost contact with it," said Major Philip Smith, a spokesman for the army in the Iraqi capital.

The path of the small model-plane-sized Raven was last recorded at about 3pm local time (10pm AEST). It had been flying over the Haifa Street area, a Sunni insurgent stronghold.

"Who knows what happened to it," said Major Smith. An Internet statement in the name of the faction of the Jordanian-born Zarqawi, Iraq's most wanted man, said its fighters had downed two US surveillance aircraft.

More Women Now Covering Up In Iraq

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Mayada Chazi does not think of herself as particularly religious. She's more interested in talking about boys, reading English novels, or dreaming of visiting New York. But she has taken to wearing the head scarf of a devout Muslim woman.

Many women who bared their heads and dressed in Western-style clothes in Saddam Hussein's secular Iraq have started covering up - some out of Islamic devotion, others in a desperate bid to shield themselves from the torrent of violence that has swept the country since the dictator's fall. Wrapped in scarfs and cloaks, the ghostlike figures shrink into the background, barely noticed as they drift past the bomb craters, sandbagged checkpoints and blast walls along Baghdad's chaotic streets.

Two U.S. Soldiers Killed in Iraq Bombings

Two American soldiers were killed and two others were wounded in separate bombings that occurred within hours, the U.S. military said Thursday. The attacks also injured an Iraqi translator. The first attack happened at about 9:45 p.m. Wednesday near rebel-held Fallujah, 40 miles west of the capital, a military statement said.

Three soldiers from the 13th Corps Support Command were wounded when their convoy was attacked with an unidentified explosive device, the statement said. One later died of his injuries at a military hospital in the capital, Baghdad.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Sadr aide released from U.S. detention in Iraq

A senior aide to rebel Iraqi cleric Moqtada al-Sadr has been released from U.S. detention, an aide to Sadr, Sheikh Mahmoud Sudani, says.

Interest in elections found waning in Iraq

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Iraqi voters are losing interest in elections scheduled for January, and not because they're worried about security. Instead, potential voters said they had no interest in or understanding of the process, according to a poll by the Iraq Center for Research & Strategic Studies. The poll, conducted Sept. 15 to 22, surveyed 3,500 people nationwide. Of those, 66.8 percent said they very likely would vote in January's elections for a National Assembly; in June, 88.8 percent had said they very likely would vote.

Just over 8 percent said they might not or definitely wouldn't vote. Only 12.7 percent of those saying they probably wouldn't vote cited security concerns. A lack of information was cited by 37.3 percent; 35.7 said they had no interest. The margin of error was 3.4 percentage points.

 

[Barking_Mad]

More murdering US soldiers

Soldiers allegedly used electrical cord in Iraqi general's death

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP) - Four Fort Carson soldiers accused of killing an Iraqi general last year allegedly used an electrical cord to help kill him, according to charging documents in the case. Chief Warrant Officers Lewis E. Welshofer Jr., Jefferson L. Williams, Sgt. 1st Class William J. Sommer and Spc. Jerry L. Loper were charged with murder and dereliction of duty on Monday in the death of Maj. Gen. Abed Hamed Mowhoush last November.

According to another document -- a Pentagon report given to Congress in June -- the soldiers allegedly put Mowhoush inside a sleeping bag and then bound him to prevent him from moving. One of the warrant officers sat on Mowhoush's chest as he was interrogated and then Mowhoush was rolled over and the officer sat on his back, the report said. According to the document, Mowhoush died as the officer sat on his back.

A death certificate issued in May said Mowhoush died of asphyxiation. All four soldiers charged were assigned to the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment, based at Fort Carson, at the time of Mowhoush's death and have since returned to the United States. Williams has transferred to the 513th Military Intelligence Brigade at Fort Gordon, Ga. Two other Fort Carson soldiers face courts-martial on manslaughter charges in connection with an unrelated death in Iraq.

Outside Baghdad, lawlessness haunts a small Iraqi town

No cars, chickens, pigs, people or roadside cigarette stands - a staple in most Iraqi towns. Shops are shuttered, homes are closed and quiet, and, most disturbing to at least one Marine charged with patrolling this rural town 20 miles south of Baghdad, there are no signs of children. "They play inside," said Sgt. Yousif Almoosawi, a platoon sergeant with the 2nd Battalion, 24th Marine Regiment, as he pointed his M-16 assault rifle down another empty alley. "Not a good sign."

Away from the spotlight of insurgent uprisings in Fallujah, Ramadi and Baghdad, Latifiyah has quietly become a lawless, lethal thorn in the side of U.S. troops here. Local police have fled or been killed, leaving the town in the hands of Islamic insurgents, kidnappers and common thugs, military officials said. To stress that point, insurgents blew up the police station two weeks ago. The streets around Latifiyah have become so laced with roadside bombs - known in military parlance as improvised explosive devices, or IEDs - that military officials here call it the "IED capital of Iraq."

.............

The struggle to return order to towns like Latifiyah highlights the challenges faced by coalition forces to secure Iraq before general elections in January, an effort that stretches beyond the big-name cities and into towns and enclaves all over the country. Without such stability, Washington and Baghdad must decide whether elections can be held in all parts of the country and whether they would be considered legitimate if all Iraqis don't participate. The U.S. also must decide how many casualties - military and civilian - it would be willing to accept to pacify more remote areas of the country. "Right now, Latifiyah is more dangerous than Fallujah," said Sgt. Devon Hawkins, another platoon sergeant with the 2nd Battalion, 24th Marines. "Every day we have an IED. Everyday someone who is seen working with Americans gets killed here. It's complete lawlessness."

 

[Barking_Mad]

Is there anywhere safe in Iraq?

Iraqi guerillas infiltrate the "Green Zone"

The US fortress inside Baghdad, where the American embassy sits behind razorwire and concrete blast barricades and where the "Interim government" of Iraq installed by the US is stored, is being penetrated more and more frequently by the Iraqi resistance. In a report today from the AP: The warning to Americans and Iraqi officials in the Green Zone followed the discovery Tuesday of an explosive device at the Green Zone Cafe, a popular hangout for Westerners living and working in the compound which houses major U.S. and Iraqi government offices. A U.S. military ordnance detachment safely disarmed it, U.S. officials said.

A loud explosion shook the Green Zone on Thursday afternoon and smoke was seen rising from inside the compound. The U.S. military had no immediate information on the incident. Insurgents regularly fire at the compound. Americans living and working in the zone were warned to avoid non-essential movements, travel in groups and avoid specific areas.

A Financial Times article from September 15 cites American military commanders:

US military officers in Baghdad have warned they cannot guarantee the security of the perimeter around the Green Zone, the headquarters of the Iraqi government and home to the US and British embassies, according to security company employees. At a briefing earlier this month, a high-ranking US officer in charge of the zone's perimeter said he had insufficient soldiers to prevent intruders penetrating the compound's defences. The US major said it was possible weapons or explosives had already been stashed in the zone, and warned people to move in pairs for their own safety. The Green Zone, in Baghdad's centre, is one of the most fortified US installations in Iraq. Until now, militants have not been able to penetrate it.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Arab intelligence reports say U.S. too quick to solely blame militant for carrying out violence in Iraq

BEIRUT -- Whenever a car bombing, beheading or other spectacular act of violence takes place in Iraq these days, U.S. officials are quick to blame Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. If he hasn't already taken credit himself. But according to an Arab intelligence assessment, al-Zarqawi is not capable of carrying out the level of attacks in Iraq that he has claimed and that American officials have blamed on him.

Al-Zarqawi's own militant group has fewer than 100 members inside Iraq, although al-Zarqawi has close ties to a Kurdish Islamist group with at least several hundred members, according to two reports produced by an Arab intelligence service. The Kurdish group, Ansar al-Islam, has provided dozens of recruits for suicide bombings since the U.S. invasion of Iraq, the reports say. And while U.S. forces relentlessly pound the insurgent strongholds of Fallujah and Samarra, claiming to hit al-Zarqawi safe houses, the elusive militant could be hiding in the northern city of Mosul.

U.S. Faces Complex Insurgency in Iraq

BAGHDAD, Iraq - The U.S. military is fighting the most complex guerrilla war in its history, with 140,000 American soldiers trained for conventional warfare flailing against a thicket of insurgent groups with competing aims and no supreme leader. In other U.S. wars, the enemy was clear. In Vietnam, a visible leader — Ho Chi Minh — led a single army fighting to unify the country under socialism. But in Iraq, the disorganized insurgency has no single commander, no political wing and no dominant group.

U.S. troops can't settle on a single approach to fight groups whose goals and operations vary. And it's hard to sort combatants from civilians in a chaotic land where large parts of some communities support the insurgents and others are too afraid to risk their lives to help foreigners. "It's more complex and challenging than any other insurgency the United States has fought," aid Bruce Hoffman, a RAND counterinsurgency expert who served as an adviser to the U.S.-led occupation administration.

Insurgents aren't striving for revolution as much as they are trying to spoil the U.S.-backed interim Iraqi regime by inflicting as much pain as possible on the United States and its Iraqi and foreign allies. "We want every U.S. dog to leave the country," said an insurgent leader in Fallujah who identified himself as Abu Thar, a 45-year-old former colonel in the Iraqi army. Beyond that, the estimated 20,000 insurgents have little in common, although groups have occasionally work together in temporary alliances of convenience. U.S. commanders describe the war as a "compound insurgency" sorted into four groups with different tactics and goals.

Abu Thar, the former colonel who was interviewed by an Iraqi reporter for The Associated Press inside insurgent-held Fallujah, gloated over his compatriots' successes, saying U.S. leaders were publicly contradicting each other about the state of the war. He also said U.S. counterattacks that kill women and children are turning public opinion in the militants' favor. "We see the conflicting statements by the U.S. administration on Iraq as another sign of their defeat," Abu Thar said. "More volunteers are coming to us because they are fed up with the humiliation and the misdeeds of the Americans. They feel it is a national and religious duty."

 

[oi2002]

French offered Dubya 15,000 troops for Iraq if the weapon inspectors were allowed to do their job, says new book.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Frustrated over sovereignty, Iraqis want the Americans out of the Green Zone

BAGHDAD (AP) - It's touted as the safest place in Baghdad, but even the thousands of normal Iraqis whose homes wound up in the U.S.-occupied Green Zone want the Americans to move out and the fortress dismantled.

"We want and demand that the Americans evacuate the Green Zone because it contains Iraqi state and private properties," Baghdad Gov. Ali al-Haidari told The Associated Press. "We believe that Iraqi authorities should regain control of this area."

While U.S. President George W. Bush insists that sovereignty was returned to Iraq three months ago, 10-square-kilometres in the heart of the Iraqi capital along the banks of the Tigris river - the site of several Saddam Hussein-era palace complexes and some of the city's finest real estate - remains U.S. territory. The American Embassy, military command centres, preferred embassies and U.S. contracting firms occupy some of the most prominent buildings, while dozens of trailer parks shielded by sandbags to guard against mortar shells and rockets are dotted around palace grounds.

"It's a world within a world," said a Western diplomat who has only left the Green Zone twice in three months. "I imagine there are some people here who never meet Iraqis."

While car bombings, kidnappings and gunfights rage across the capital, life behind the blast walls resembles suburban America: women in shorts jog along tree-lined avenues, off-duty soldiers lounge by the pool and the Green Zone Cafe and two Chinese restaurants are packed in the evenings. Everything from pornographic movies to mobile phone accessories are on sale at the local bazaar.

US air strike kills 11 in Iraq's Falluja

A U.S. air raid, aimed at foreign fighters led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, killed 11 people and wounded 17 after a wedding party in the rebel-held Iraqi city of Falluja Friday, residents and doctors said. The U.S. military said a "precision strike" hit a safe-house used by associates of the Jordanian Islamist militant in northwest Falluja at 1:15 a.m.

Rescuers dug bodies from rubble with their hands after the raid on the house where residents said a wedding party had just taken place. They said the groom died and the bride was wounded. "Credible intelligence sources confirmed Zarqawi leaders were meeting at the safe-house at the time of the strike," a U.S. military statement said.

It said more than a dozen air strikes had killed several Zarqawi leaders in the past month, including Mohammed al-Lubnani and Abu Anas al-Shami. It described Shami as Zarqawi's number two and spiritual adviser......

......At the hospital, where blood pooled on the floor, a doctor named Rafah al-Hayat said 11 people had been killed and 17 wounded. One of his colleagues, Khaled Nasser, said nine females aged between 5 and 50 were among the wounded. Reuters television footage showed four of the wounded women lying bloodied and bandaged in the hospital.

Residents and local doctors say many of the U.S. raids have inflicted civilian casualties in a city held by Sunni insurgents since a U.S. assault in April failed to dislodge them. Before the latest raid, Falluja's chief negotiator said on Thursday talks with the government could bear fruit soon. "The negotiations with the Iraqi government and the U.S. army have reached a positive stage and an agreement has been reached for radical solutions," Sheikh Khalid al-Jumaili told Reuters.

BBC Version of story here:

Thursday is traditionally the day for holding weddings in Iraq, says the BBC's Karen Allen in Baghdad.

Soldiers Catch Suspected Bomb Maker; 1500 Artillery Rounds Seized

Baghdad, Iraq -- Working off a tip, Task Force Baghdad troops detained a truck carrying more than 1,500 155-millimeter artillery rounds Oct. 7. This seizure is one of the largest by the task force to date. Ground forces were alerted to the suspected vehicle and converged on it and detained the driver and passenger. The munitions were found in the back of the truck during a search of the vehicle.

An explosive ordnance disposal team will destroy the seized munitions.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Ex-general says U.S. troops need to stay in Iraq at least 10 years

October 8, 2004 3:37 AM

DELRAY BEACH, Fla. A retired general who headed the air campaign in the 1991 Gulf War says it'll take at least ten years before Iraq is stable enough for the U-S to withdraw its troops.

Retired Air Force General Chuck Horner said in a speech in Florida yesterday that the U-S can withdraw one of its troops for every ten Iraqis it trains to defend their own country. He says his ten-year estimate is based on how long it took to rid Germany of Nazis after World War Two. Horner says he's not for or against the war but its results have been a "mixed bag." He also didn't criticize the Bush administration directly, saying war should always be a last resort.

240 detainees freed from prisons in Iraq

BAGHDAD, Iraq - About 240 detainees were freed Thursday from U.S. and Iraqi custody, a sign of what Iraqi human-rights lawyers call a marked improvement in prisoner handling in the past two months. None of those freed was a so-called high-value detainee, said Lt. Col. Barry Johnson, a military spokesman. High-value detainees are processed separately from the 1,700 "security detainees" at Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad and Camp Bucca in southern Iraq, he said.

 

[Louloubelle]

new claims break that Bigley has been killed by his kidnapers
as yet unconfirmed

 

[Barking_Mad]

British Hostage Beheaded in Iraq, Video Shows

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - British hostage Ken Bigley has been beheaded in Iraq (news - web sites), three weeks after he was kidnapped by militants demanding the release of women held by U.S.-led forces, a video seen by Reuters showed on Friday. Guerrilla sources in the rebel-held city of Falluja said earlier that Bigley, who was being held by a militant group led by alleged al Qaeda ally Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, was killed on Thursday afternoon in Latifiya, southwest of Baghdad.

In the video, seen by a Reuters witness in the office of a foreign news organization in Baghdad, the 62-year-old engineer was shown making a statement as six militants stood behind him, before one cut his head off with a knife. The tape showed Bigley wearing an orange jump suit of the type worn by detainees in U.S. prisons including the detention center at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.

Commenting on earlier reports of Bigley's death, a British Foreign Office spokesman told Reuters in London: "We cannot corroborate the reports ... We are in close touch with Mr. Bigley's family at this difficult time." Britain's Sky TV, however, quoted British government sources as saying Bigley had been killed.