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Bloodshed In Baghdad, Mosul
CBS News Saturday 20 November 2004 Insurgents attacked a U.S. Army patrol Saturday in Baghdad, killing one American soldier and injuring nine others, the U.S. military said. The unit came under coordinated attack, which included roadside bombs, small arms fire and rocket-propelled grenades, the military said. The statement did not say where the 7 a.m. attack occurred. However, three U.S. Army vehicles were seen on fire after an insurgent attack early Saturday on a police station in the Azamiyah district. One Iraqi policeman was killed. Azamiyah is a Sunni Muslim neighborhood where U.S. and Iraqi troops raided a major mosque the day before, in an operation that appeared to be part of a crackdown on militant Sunni clerics opposed to the U.S.-led attack on Fallujah. Iraqi officials were trying to identify four decapitated bodies found in the northern city of Mosul. American and Iraqi forces detained 30 suspected guerrillas overnight in Mosul, the U.S. military said Saturday. Elsewhere in the capital, a Ministry of Public Works spokesman says four government workers have been shot dead while heading to work. The spokesman says the drive-by shooting was committed by "brutal terrorists." In western Baghdad, heavy fighting broke out between gunmen and Iraqi National Guards and American troops. Three Iraqi National Guardsmen were killed by roadside bombs in the same area, police said. And in downtown Baghdad, one civilian is dead and another injured from what witnesses say was a suicide car bombing. The blast occurred in a busy commercial area that has several hotels housing foreigners. In Other Developments:
The four decapitated bodies in Mosul were found Thursday and have been turned over to Iraqi authorities, said Lt. Col. Paul Hastings, a spokesman for Task Force Olympia. On Friday, a statement posted on an Islamist Web site in the name of Jordanian terror leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's group said it had "slaughtered" two Iraqi National Guard officers "in the presence of a big crowd" in Mosul. The claim included no photos or video and could not be verified. There was no way of saying whether the bodies had been decapitated in a public manner, as the Web site claimed, said Hastings, adding that U.S. troops were "not able to identify them and say whether they were bodies of Iraqi National Guard, police or just anybody." Separately, an Iraqi extremist group claimed responsibility Saturday for kidnapping and killing two members of a Kurdish political group in Mosul, posting a video on the Internet of their deaths. The Ansar al-Sunnah Army said the two, from the Kurdistan Democratic Party, were interrogated for at least seven days before they were executed. It was unclear how long they had been held in captivity. The claim's authenticity could not be verified. Back in the Azimiyah district in Baghdad Saturday, smoke rose from smashed and burning shops along a commercial street and firefighters struggled to put out the blaze. U.S. helicopters circled overhead and ambulances were driving to the scene of the clashes. The Iraqi government has warned that Islamic clerics who incite violence will be considered as "participating in terrorism." Some already have been arrested, including members of the Sunni clerical Association of Muslim Scholars. U.S. troops also raided a Sunni mosque in Qaim, near the Syrian border, a cleric said Friday, calling it retaliation for opposing the Fallujah offensive. Imam Maudafar Abdul Wahab said his mosque was gathering food and supplies for Fallujah, and that the Americans took about $2,000 worth of Iraqi currency meant for mosque repairs. U.S. and Iraqi authorities are concerned about a public backlash against the Fallujah offensive among the minority Sunni community, especially as word spreads of the widespread devastation there. Few Shiite clerics have condemned the Fallujah operation except for followers of Muqtada al-Sadr, whose militia battled American troops in two major campaigns this year. On Friday, U.S. troops arrested an al-Sadr representative near the holy city of Karbala - the second arrest of his aides in two days, al-Sadr's office said. Both had spoken out against the Fallujah attack, which began last week. Insurgents said to be reeling from the loss of their base in Fallujah struck back Friday with car bombings and by firing rockets or mortars at the Green Zone, the leafy Baghdad enclave that houses the headquarters of the Iraqi and U.S. leadership here. Six people were killed in one car bombing in Baghdad, police said. Iraqis, GIs Share Uneasy Relationship
Saturday 20 November 2004 Iraqis, U.S. Military share uneasy relationship fraught with distrust, anger. When a hail of bullets hit the car in which Jinan Adnan and her family were riding, she followed her maternal instincts and paid with her life. Adnan, 37, used her body to shield her three children in the back seat. Her husband and the children survived. She was mortally wounded. Because American soldiers had been in a firefight nearby around the time, it remains unclear if a U.S. bullet killed her, though her husband, Aref Taha, says he saw four American soldiers firing in the car's direction. "That's what Americans do, isn't that so?" Taha said. "They do this all the time in Iraq." Taha said he did not lodge a complaint with the U.S. military, which had no comment on the alleged incident. It is not clear why American soldiers would fire at a car carrying a family, although similar incidents have taken place when cars failed to stop at checkpoints. The four American soldiers moments earlier had checked the family's car for weapons, Taha said. But even if it can't be proved that an American bullet killed Adnan, it's the kind of heartbreaking incident that Iraqis routinely blame on U.S. soldiers. Accounts of events such as the Nov. 9 shooting of the Taha family have spread through mosques, coffee shops and markets of this crisis-ridden nation, fueling anger and stoking the insurgency. The credibility Iraqis give to such accounts stems in part from the humiliation felt by many because of the U.S. military presence in Iraq despite the formal end to the occupation on June 28. Many of the stories amount to little more than hearsay or are grossly exaggerated. But some are credible, and they have contributed to an image of American troops as trigger-happy, fond of excessive force and acting with little regard for Iraqi lives. The recent video of a U.S. Marine shooting a wounded and apparently unarmed Iraqi in a Fallujah mosque, aired frequently by Arab satellite television stations, has only served to reinforce the negative stereotype. "They are criminals," Zaid, Adnan's 15-year-old son, said of the Americans on Friday. His father said he cannot find words to describe his rage at the loss of his wife of 16 years. Making matters worse, U.S. troops surrounded the cemetery in Mahmoudiya, an insurgent-heavy area south of Baghdad, while his wife was being buried on Nov. 10. Anmar Faleh, who attended the funeral, said the Americans told the 1,000 mourners that they surrounded the cemetery because they believed insurgents killed in a gunfight the previous day were being buried. The U.S. military has investigated virtually every case of unlawful killing or gross abuse by its soldiers in Iraq. Some of these investigations have led to trials and convictions. But Iraqis remain bitter. Killings are not the only cause of discontent. Other acts that provoke rage include raids of private homes, the detention of women and the perceived humiliation of men in front of women and children. The recent U.S. military campaign to retake the Sunni city of Fallujah has given rise to an entirely new set of dangerous accusations. Residents who fled Fallujah this week speak of U.S. soldiers defacing mosques, destroying minarets to deny insurgents their use as firing positions and causing widespread devastation. U.S. military commanders say their men operate under difficult circumstances in a country where they don't speak the language, don't share the Islamic faith of most of its people and face the constant threat of attack. Individual American soldiers complain that the rules governing when they can shoot are too restrictive and almost guarantee the insurgents the first shot. Despite the growing insurgent threat, the U.S. military has not stopped making overtures to the local population, distributing toys and school supplies to children and funding thousands of small and medium development projects. "What you have is scared young men and women with the potential to strike hard when faced with any perceived threat," said Marc Garlasco, a former Iraq analyst at the Pentagon who's now with Human Rights Watch, the New York-based rights group. Garlasco blames some of the unlawful killings of Iraqis by American soldiers on cultural differences as well as the difficulties of identifying threats in populated areas. Adding to the fear and suspicion are methods used by the insurgents: booby-trapping corpses, pretending to surrender and then opening fire and ramming checkpoints with explosives-laden cars or suicide bombers. Nicole Choueiry, a spokeswoman for Amnesty International, says the human rights group has not detected a pattern of such killings by U.S. soldiers, but blames "recklessness" by the Americans for those that come to the attention of the London-based group. Frank Schaeffer, the American author of the recently published book "Voices from the Front: Letters Home From America's Military Family," says U.S. soldiers in Iraq often long for a meaning for their mission and are eager to do good for Iraqis. "At the least sign of being appreciated by ordinary people in Iraq they are so happy," he wrote in an e-mail to The Associated Press. 'The War is Over, but There is No Peace... and the
Killings Go On' Saturday 20 November 2004 The Iraqi journalist Abbas Ahmed Ibrahim tells of the horror and hardship in a first-hand account from the devastated city of Fallujah. This is a strange time in Fallujah. They say the war is over, but there is no peace. Every day there is shooting, and there are still killings going on. There is very little left of the town now, everywhere there are buildings which have been destroyed. There is also a terrible smell. We know what it is - it is the smell of dead bodies. Many have now been cleared away, but the smell does not go away, it will stay with us for a long time. The Americans say they are just finishing off the insurgents, but then they have been saying that for a few days now, so people here ask "who have they got left to finish off?" We hear of things like American soldiers killing wounded prisoners in a mosque, but that news is recycled to us from people outside. It is not possible to go out and find out what is going on. I am not staying in Fallujah out of choice. But I am afraid to try to leave. I am 36 years old, The American troops have been arresting any males between the ages of 15 and 45 who have attempted to leave. They say civilians were told to get out of Fallujah, so any man who stayed behind must be in the mujahedin. There are Iraqi men, with their faces hidden by scarves, with the American troops. These are the informers. If they point you out as an insurgent then there is no chance of proving that you are innocent. There are people who are settling personal or tribal grudges like this. You do not know who will denounce you. The reason I stayed behind is the same as many of the other remaining men here, to protect my house. My wife and parents begged me to go with them when I sent them away to Amiriyah, but I would not listen. I now realize what a mistake that was. I am staying with relations, and my house has probably been destroyed. The Americans were shooting everywhere, from the air and the ground, when they came into the town. The house I am staying in was hit by machine-gun fire. Those days and nights were very frightening. Their shells and bombs would make everything shake, and it seemed to go on day and night. That has stopped now. But there is also a lot of damage being caused when they carry out searches of houses. There are very few of us - civilians - left inside Fallujah now, I do not know how many because people do not go out. We are staying in little groups, not really going out much beyond our streets, because it is still very dangerous. I do not know if my cousin's family are all right, although, in a normal time, their home would only be 10 minutes' drive away. Most of the families here have someone who has been injured, arrested, and, sometimes, killed. Things are very bad here, but then they have been bad for such a long time now that one forgets what normal life was like. There is no power or water, and very little food left, and there is simply no medicine left. People I know are very ill, mainly from bad water, but they are not getting treatment. We were told that the Red Crescent and other aid organizations wanted to send food and medicine into the town, but it was stopped on the orders of Allawi (Iyad Allawi, Iraq's interim Prime Minister). This has made people even more angry. It makes them think he is taking the side of the Americans against his own people. The Americans say that they have set up centers for distributing food and medicine. They also say that Fallujah hospital has now been open again for more than a week. This is true in both cases. But the problem is that getting to them is very risky. You can get arrested by the Americans or you might get killed. Two women were shot trying to get food for their families. The Americans say the mujahedin shot them. Most people think it was the Americans themselves who did this. But I do not think that is the case. It probably was the mujahedin. But why is this happening if the Americans are in control of Fallujah? I do not know what is going to happen to us over the next few days. I have news that my family is all right, so a big worry has been lifted. Maybe things will be safer when other civilians start coming back into Fallujah. ------- The Mulindwas Communication Group
"With Yoweri Museveni, Uganda is in anarchy" Groupe de communication Mulindwas "avec Yoweri Museveni, l'Ouganda est dans l'anarchie" |
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