*IRAQ: latest news and developments

[nino_savatte]

beaten to it! are the americans still using those amazing smart bombs which never miss their target?

You mean the ones that contain depleted uranium?

 

[freethepeeps]

This is what 'liberation' looks like

WARNING: Distressing images

Link doesn't click through.

Go to english.aljazeera.net and click on Aljazeera exclusive in pictures/Falluja Siege in Right Hand column

 

[Barking_Mad]

This is what 'liberation' looks like

WARNING: Distressing images

Link doesn't click through.

Go to english.aljazeera.net and click on Aljazeera exclusive in pictures/Falluja Siege in Right Hand column

I wonder what the effect of the BBC showing those images on the 6pm bulletin would be?

 

[Yossarian]

Latest news is that American helicopters have fired missiles at a mosque, killing 40 people.

This seems pretty consistent with the theme of 'total idiocy' that characterises the American occupation...

 

[Barking_Mad]

US Denies Reports Americans Held By Iraq's Al-Sadr

NEW YORK -(Dow Jones)- The Pentagon Wednesday denied reports made by an Iraqi militia that some U.S. military forces had been kidnapped by its forces, MSNBC reported.

The Pentagon did confirm, however, that New York Times reporter John Burns and a photographer were held briefly and then released by the Mehdi Army militia, loyal to Iraqi cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, MSNBC reported. The militia had earlier claimed to have captured an unspecified number of coalition troops south of Baghdad.

The Times had reported that a number of its Baghdad staff were held by al- Sadr's forces for nearly eight hours but were release unharmed. The staff consisted of a reporter, a photographer, drivers, security guards and an interpreter, the Times reported.

http://news.nasdaq.com/news/newsSto...ACQDJON200404071145DOWJONESDJONLINE000590.htm

 

[Barking_Mad]

I don't like to quote Fox too often but here you go.......

The fighting in Fallujah and neighboring Ramadi (search), where commanders confirmed 12 Marines were killed and at least 20 wounded Tuesday, was part of an intensified and spreading uprising involving both Sunni and Shiites stretching from Kirkuk in the north to near Basra in the south. At least 60 Iraqis were killed and more than 120 wounded in overnight fighting in Fallujah.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,116396,00.html

 

[bigfish]

I wonder what the effect of the BBC showing those images on the 6pm bulletin would be?

You'd have more chance of getting a betting license for Westminister Abbey than getting the Baloney Broadcasting Corporation to show anything that might help undermine public opinion further... and that goes double for dead babies.

Great work on tracking the unfolding bloodbath BM. "Pacification" has got a definite Nazi ring about it don't you think?

The reprisal mentality guiding the American military forces calls to mind nothing less than the conduct of Nazi occupation forces in Europe during World War II. By the end of the war, the very term reprisal had become synonymous with the mass killing of civilian populations supporting popular and legitimate guerilla warfare against the Nazis. Hitler, in answer to the operations of Soviet partisans, for example, issued instructions in 1942 that “whatever succeeds is correct.” The German military command responded by ordering its occupation troops to use “any means, even against women and children, provided they are conducive to success.”


The prospect is looming in Iraq for an orgy of killing by US troops, in desperate and murderous efforts to carry out the orders of the Bush administration that they bring the situation under control. Bush declared from North Carolina that the US had to “stay the course, and we will stay the course [in Iraq].”


He was joined by Democrat presidential candidate John Kerry. While calling again for the involvement of the United Nations and other powers in Iraq, he declared his full support for “whatever’s necessary to protect our troops that are there and to provide for stability and success.” Other leading Democrats have followed suit.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/apr2004/iraq-a06.shtml

 

[Barking_Mad]

Channel 4 just spoke to a journalist from The Observer who is in Baghdad, and I just caught the end of it but he said the popularity of the resistence is much stronger than the US are admitting to.

 

[cynical_bastard]

They just said on the News that no bodies were recovered from the bombed mosque

 

[Barking_Mad]

US Lose Najaf........Rummy tells is whats what..

Rumsfeld Says Those Opposed To Free Iraq Now Desperate

WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- The fighting in Iraq has created a "serious problem" for the U.S., but the overall situation isn't out-of-control, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said Wednesday. Rumsfeld also said Iraq has entered a critical phase in regards to its future and warned the Iraqi people that they can't afford to "sit on the sidelines" if they wish to see a free and democratic Iraq emerge.

"What we're witnessing today in Iraq is a power-play between those who favor terrorism and a return to oppression, and those determined to have freedom and self-government," Rumsfeld said.

"This is an important moment in Iraq's history. The future of the Iraqi people is certainly at stake. So the stakes are high. They're high for Iraq, they're high for the region, and indeed, they're high for the world," Rumsfeld said.

To help stabilize the situation, Rumsfeld warned that the return of veteran troops from Iraq will likely be delayed in a move that would build up overall U.S. military forces in the country. He also said that if military commanders on the ground need additional forces sent to Iraq, he will sign the deployment orders.

Rumsfeld made his comments as fighting continues to rage across a large swathe of Iraq with coalition forces battling Sunni insurgents in the north and Shiite militias in the south. Rumsfeld conceded the coalition forces have lost control of at least one city, Najaf, but expressed confidence the military will be able to reassert control over the country as a whole.

http://news.nasdaq.com/news/newsSto...ACQDJON200404071547DOWJONESDJONLINE000877.htm

 

[Barking_Mad]

Influential Iraq Cleric Urges Calm, Slams US Tactics

NEW YORK (Dow Jones)--The Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani, the most influential cleric for Iraq's majority Shiite Muslims, on Wednesday called for restraint following days of intensified clashes between U.S.-led coalition forces and various insurgent groups, Fox News reported.

Fox said al-Sistani is in Baghdad's main Shiite neighborhood of Sadr city, where fighting between U.S. forces and militants continued overnight.

While al-Sistani appealed for calm, the cleric also condemned the force employed by the U.S. military to battle insurgents, Fox reported.

In Fallujah, U.S. forces dropped laser-guided bombs on a mosque compound where insurgents had taken refuge, and eyewitnesses said about 40 Iraqis were killed as a result.

Al-Sistani commands popular appeal among the Shiite majority in Iraq. His appeal followed a call by a radical Shiite cleric, Muqtada al-Sadr, urging his followers to launch attacks against coalition troops.

http://framehosting.dowjonesnews.com/sample/samplestory.asp?StoryID=2004040718510008&Take=1

 

[Barking_Mad]

deleted, board went screwy

 

[Barking_Mad]

Update.........

In nearby Ramadi, mosques broadcast calls for a holy war as blasts echoed across the town and black smoke billowed. Residents crouched in houses as masked insurgents and Marines fought in alleyways. Women and children sobbed. Twelve Marines were killed Tuesday in a seven-hour battle in Ramadi -- one of the costliest single losses for U.S. forces since the war that toppled Saddam began last March.

RUMSFELD SAYS SITUATION UNDER CONTROL

The upsurge in violence has prompted Bush critics to suggest U.S. forces face a Vietnam-style quagmire, but Rumsfeld said the situation was not spiraling out of control and only "relatively small numbers of people" were causing the violence.

"This is an important moment in Iraq's history. The future of the Iraqi people is certainly at stake. So the stakes are high. They're high for Iraq, they're high for the region and indeed they're high for the world," Rumsfeld said.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=4779439&section=news

 

[cynical_bastard]

The Washington Post is reporting Shiite mosques are calling for support for Sunni fighters and vice versa

 

[Bernie Gunther]

The Guardian is reporting at least 280 dead, 400 wounded in Fallujah, with more buried under rubble and the casualties likely to grow.

 

[Barking_Mad]

The Washington Post is reporting Shiite mosques are calling for support for Sunni fighters and vice versa

I found this passage especially telling from Cynical Bastard's piece above...

The neighborhood, though Shiite, is not normally regarded as Sadr turf. Most Kadhimiya residents, like most of Iraq's majority Shiite population, look to Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani for instruction. But Abu Ali Hashem, a Sistani follower and an official of a hallowed Shiite shrine, estimated that half of the neighborhood's Sistani followers were joining in Sadr's protest in the absence of any instruction otherwise from their own leader.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Battles rage from north to south

With the worst fighting since George Bush formally declared the war over last May, the coalition lost control of several areas. The most humiliating reverse was at Kut, when Ukrainian troops were forced out by a Shia militia.........

.......Mr Sadr had earlier declared: "Iraq will be another Vietnam for America and the occupiers." Mr Sadr, who controls the Mahdi Army militia, said he opposed the transfer of power to the provisional Iraqi government on June 30 and wanted power given to "honest Iraqis". Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, deputy director for coalition operations, promised "deliberate, precise and powerful offensive operations to destroy the Mahdi Army"........

..........The coalition position worsened considerably last night when the most senior cleric in Iraq, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, a moderate, refused to condemn Mr Sadr's uprising. Instead, he condemned "the methods used by occupation forces in the current escalating situation in Iraq ... and any action that disturbs order and prevents officials from carrying out their duties".

The US-appointed governing council also urged the Americans not to make the crisis worse by excessive force.

"More violence will cause more violence and this will be an endless spiral. We all made these points," Adnan Pachachi, a council member and former foreign minister, said. "By surrounding Falluja and pounding it they reacted with greater force than we expected." In Kut, Ukrainian forces withdrew from the city after overnight gun battles in which 12 Iraqis died. One Ukrainian soldier was killed and five were wounded. Mr Sadr's followers seized weapons stores. A South African working for a British security company was killed.

The Mahdi Army was in virtual control of Kufa and Kerbala. Clashes with Polish patrols in Kerbala left at least seven Iraqis dead, including Mr Sadr's representative and two Iranian pilgrims.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1188158,00.html

 

[Barking_Mad]

Iraq Shiite Group Has Coalition Hostages In Najaf - BBC

LONDON -(Dow Jones)- Followers of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr have taken hostage some members of the U.S.-led coalition in the southern Iraqi city of Najaf, the BBC reports Thursday.

http://news.nasdaq.com/news/newsSto...ACQDJON200404080451DOWJONESDJONLINE000218.htm

 

[Barking_Mad]

Spain denies any troops hostage in Iraq
Thu 8 April, 2004 09:56

MADRID (Reuters) - Spain's Defence Ministry has denied that any military personnel were being held hostage in Iraq by a Shi'ite militia.Fighters of the Mehdi Army militia led by firebrand cleric Moqtada al-Sadr have swept onto the streets of Shi'ite cities across Iraq this week.

An aide to Sadr told a news conference in the Shi'ite holy city of Najaf on Wednesday that soldiers from the U.S.-led coalition had been captured in fighting. Asked on Thursday about media reports that Spanish soldiers were being held hostage by Sadr's militia, a Spanish defence ministry spokesman said: "It's a lie."

Foreign Ministry officials declined immediate comment on whether any Spanish civilians might have been abducted in Iraq. This week's intense fighting in Iraq has killed 35 U.S. and allied soldiers and several hundred Iraqis. It has elicited U.S. assertions of resolve, but prompted signs of nervousness among some other countries with troops in Iraq.

http://www.reuters.co.uk/newsPackageArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=490802&section=news

 

[Barking_Mad]

Oh, here's an interesting piece........

Iraq Governing Council member to reconsider position if US offensive continues

DOHA (AFX) - Iraqi interim Governing Council member Mohsen Abdul Hamid said he will reconsider his participation in the body if the US-led coalition does not stop "spilling the blood" of Iraqis, Al-Jazeera satellite channel reported. http://www.iii.co.uk/shares/?type=news&articleid=4946717&action=article

 

[Kaka Tim]

Iraqi Sunnis, Shiites March to Fallujah Bearing Food, AFP Says.

http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000087&sid=aRdzCAV9u5s8&refer=top_world_news

April 8 (Bloomberg) -- Thousands of Sunni and Shiite Muslims headed today on foot toward the town of Fallujah, accompanied by cars laden with food and medical supplies, Agence France-Presse reported.

Muslim groups called for Iraqis to march peacefully to the predominantly Sunni town and to take supplies there, AFP said. The protesters called for Islamic unity and carried Iraqi flags, and pictures of Palestinian Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, killed last month by Israel, and Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, whose Mahdi army is rebelling against U.S.-led coalition troops, AFP said.



hmmm - could turn very nasty if the marines dont let them into the city.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Plea to lift siege as Falluja toll mounts

Doctors in Falluja want the siege on the town lifted for shifting patients with serious injuries even as brutal street battles rage. Two hundred and eighty people have been killed since the start of the siege and 400 more injured, said Tahr al-Issawi, the director of Falluja's hospital on Thursday.

"We also know of dead and wounded in various places buried under rubble, but we cannot reach them because of the fighting," he said. Clinics in the town, 65km west of Baghdad, are struggling to treat victims of the US attacks, said Aljazeera's correspondent Ahmad Mansur.

US helicopters and snipers are firing on ambulances and civilian vehicles trying to take the wounded to clinics or the hospital, the correspondent said. "One civilian car trying to reach a clinic hoisted a white flag but still came under fire," he said

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/79CAAE90-3E7F-4815-B47D-46863A64A7E6.htm

 

[Barking_Mad]

UK journalist 'kidnapped' in Iraq

A UK and US journalist were kidnapped at gunpoint by bandits in Iraq, interrogated as spies by Mujahideen and finally released, it has been reported. Stephen Farrell wrote in the Times newspaper that he and a companion were forced from the road near Falluja by a lorry of "bandits" firing Kalashnikovs.

He said they were robbed and taken to a Mujahideen village elder's house. They were freed after Mr Farrell showed a photo in which he had long hair - proving they were civilians, he said.

Mr Farrell said he and freelance journalist Orly Halperin had been travelling in an armoured Mercedes from Israel and were between the town of Ramadi and Falluja when the bandits or "ali baba" began firing at them, eventually hitting a tyre.

He said the men were armed with guns, knives and rocket-propelled grenades and his colleague translated them as saying: "You are woman. We won't kill you. But he's finished". "For the next ten minutes we repeat, like a mantra, "sahafi, sahafi, sahafi"(journalist) in stereo as the frenzied thieves rifle through wallets finding evidence of our "occupier" status", Mr Farrell wrote.

He said the area where they were stopped was a "no-go" area for Iraqi police and coalition troops stayed away unless heavily armoured: "Each village is guarded by masked youths with RPGs".

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3610521.stm

 

[Barking_Mad]

A British Army Land Rover lies burned while surrounded by children near the southern Iraq city of Amara. The British military said 15 people were killed in the past 48 hours after clashes erupted. REUTERS

 

[Barking_Mad]

Iraq Sunni/Shiite marchers breach US roadblocks to bring aid to Fallujah

BAGHDAD (AFX) - Thousands of Iraqi sympathizers, both Sunni and Shiite Muslim, have forced their way through US military roadblocks in a bid to bring aid from the capital to the besieged Sunni rebel bastion of Fallujah. Troops in armoured vehicles attempted to stop the convoy of cars and pedestrians from reaching the western town, where US marines have met ferocious resistance in a two-day-old offensive against the insurgents. But the US contingents have been overwhelmed as residents of villages west of the capital came to the convoy's assistance.

http://www.iii.co.uk/shares/?type=news&articleid=4946927&action=article

 

[Barking_Mad]

Report coming in that the Iraqi Interior Minister has resigned - BBC - no further news.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Iraqi interior minister resigns

BAGHDAD - (AFX) The Iraqi interior minister Nuri Badran said he has submitted his resignation after US overseer Paul Bremer expressed dissatisfaction with the performance of his ministry

http://www.iii.co.uk/shares/?type=news&articleid=4946935&action=article

 

[Gumbert]

bbc radio 4. three japanese kidnapped and seven south koreans killed. any confirmation?

 

[Barking_Mad]

Here Gumbert....

8 Koreans, 3 Japanese Kidnapped in Iraq

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates - Three Japanese and eight South Koreans were kidnapped in Iraq on Thursday, according to media reports. The Arabic TV station al-Jazeera aired video of the Japanese blindfolded.

The South Koreans were detained by unidentified "armed men" in Iraq but one was later released, the South Korean Yonhap news agency reported, citing an unnamed Foreign Ministry official in Seoul. The report gave no further details....

.....The Japanese were taken by a group identifying itself as the "Mujahedeen Squadrons," which Al-Jazeera said gave a three-day ultimatum for Japan to announce it will withdraw its troops or they would be killed.

"Three of your sons have fallen into our hands," the Al-Jazeera announcer said, quoting a statement he said came with the video tape. "We offer you two choices: either pull out your forces, or we will burn them alive. We give you three days starting the day this tape is broadcast."


http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/news/breaking_news/8384819.htm?1c

 

[Gumbert]

Kerry lays into Bush for Iraq imbroglio

So, the warmonger who wants to send more troops to the fires of iraq speaks.. Smacks of opportunism.

Democratic presidential contender John Kerry has dubbed the US-led occupation of Iraq a "mess."

Attacking the Bush administration's handling of Iraq on Wednesday, Kerry also said it was time for President George Bush to acknowledge his difficulties in managing Iraq to the world.

"They are doing it in such a frankly inept way," Kerry said.

Hand over

Set to challenge Bush in November-presidential elections, Kerry urged the US-led occupation authority to hand over responsibility in Iraq to a "legitimate international entity."

He added that "people don’t want to go to work for Paul Bremer – the US administrator in Baghdad."

"I am not the president and I did not create this mess, so I don’t want to acknowledge a mistake that I have not made," Kerry said.

"But let me tell you something, the president needs to step up and acknowledge that there are difficulties and that the world needs to be involved, and they need to reverse this policy," he said.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/4757321E-F638-4926-B3CC-2EADA3FA8C76.htm