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MARCH 2004

 

Day 336: March 31, 2004

 

Five occupation soldiers killed in Iraq
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/854E5652-C575-4409-B627-DE92D9E540E5.htm 

The Ramadi area has seen many  attacks

Five occupation soldiers have been killed in a roadside bomb attack west of Baghdad. The forces were driving in one vehicle in the province of al-Anbar, said a US military official on Wednesday.  Army officials refused to reveal the nationalities of those killed but the area is occupied by US forces.  In a separate incident also west of Baghdad, suspected fighters attacked two cars and set them on fire, burning several passengers.  One witness said resistance fighters opened fire on the vehicles in the restive town of Falluja.  read more

 

Captain may face action over friendly fire deaths
The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1182369,00.html 

A marines captain has been blamed for the worst US incident of "friendly fire" in the Iraq war and could face disciplinary action. The officer, an unnamed ground-based air controller, called in fighter jets to strike suspected Iraqi positions near the southern city of Nassiriya a year ago, unaware that dozens of marines were fighting in the area, according to a US military report. Ten marines were believed to have been killed by the strike on the fourth day of the war. The incident prompted a year-long inquiry by an 11-member US military team.  Investigators said that the captain, who was in Nassiriya at the time, could not see the action in a barren area near a canal and should have consulted his battalion commander, who would have known that US troops were in the area.   read more

 

Suicide Bomber Wounds Six Iraqis
Daniel Cooney, Associated Press
http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-3923035,00.html 
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - A suicide bomber blew up explosives in his car when he was near a convoy of government vehicles northeast of Baghdad on Wednesday, wounding six Iraqis, police said. It was the second suicide attack in two days in Iraq. The blast occurred in the city of Baqouba, about 30 miles northeast of Baghdad, said police Col. Ali Hossein. The attacked convoy was normally used to transport the Diala provincial governor, Abdullah al-Joubori, but he was elsewhere at the time. Three of the wounded were al-Joubori's bodyguards, the three others bystanders, Hossein said. The bomber died in the attack. On Tuesday, a suicide bombing outside the house of a police chief in Hillah, about 60 miles south of Baghdad, killed the attacker and wounded seven others.  read more
 

Day 335: March 30, 2004

 

U.S. military gets home comforts in Iraq
By Denis G. Gray, Associated Press
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq%20Upgrading%20Lifestyle

U.S. coalition soldiers poolside at Saddam Hussein's palace in Baghdad (AP photo).

BAQOUBA, Iraq -- Fresh strawberries from California. Stationary biking to the beat of rap music. Free Internet. And within gunsights, indoor basketball courts and maybe some cappuccino bars.  What a difference a year makes. During the Iraq war and the ensuing months, U.S. troops invariably ate MREs - packaged military rations - showered with bottled water and slept in packed, sweltering tents or on the cold desert floor.  Now, settling in for the long haul, the lifestyles of American soldiers are getting major upgrades. The world beyond the concertina wires may be just as dangerous as last year, but within military bases across Iraq, "Little Americas" are acquiring better food, more recreational activities and comfortable living quarters.  read more

 

Day 334: March 29, 2004

 

Friendly fire deaths of Marines in Iraq detailed in report
10 possibly killed in bridge operation
Hector Becerra and Robert J. Lopez, Los Angeles Times
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2004/03/29/friendly_fire_deaths_of_marines_in_iraq_detailed_in_report/ 
As many as 10 Marines may have been killed by friendly fire in the midst of the deadliest battle of the Iraq war when a Marine air controller mistakenly cleared Air Force A-10 jets to shoot on US positions, according to a long-awaited military investigation. The report, portions of which were obtained Saturday, paints a chaotic picture of the March 23, 2003, battle in the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriyah, as Marines fought to seize two bridges crucial to the American advance on Baghdad. read more

 

Day 333: March 28, 2004

 

Day 332: March 27, 2004

 

Day 331: March 26, 2004

 

Day 330: March 25, 2004

 

Day 329: March 24, 2004

 

The Forgotten Victims of the War in Iraq
Derrick Z. Jackson , Boston Globe
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0324-01.htm 
LAST WEEK at the White House, President Bush marked the first anniversary of the Iraq invasion by saying: "The murders in Madrid are a reminder that the civilized world is at war. And in this new kind of war, civilians find themselves suddenly on the front lines."  There was no mention of Iraqi civilians killed by American bombs and bullets in the invasion and occupation.  Bush went to Fort Campbell, Ky., to tell soldiers that they had liberated a nation "in which millions of people lived in fear, and many thousands disappeared into mass graves. That was the life in Iraq for more than a generation until the Americans arrived."  The soldiers applauded. There was no mention of the civilian carnage caused by the arrival of the Americans.  At both Fort Campbell and in another speech in Orlando, where the cr d chanted "USA! USA! USA!" Bush said America will do whatever it takes to defeat and destroy the terrorists "so that we do not have to face them in our own country."  In his three speeches, Bush made no mention of the Iraqis who were permanently defaced.   read more

 

Day 328: March 23, 2004

 

Day 327: March 22, 2004

 

Day 326: March 21, 2004

 

Day 325: March 20, 2004

 

Day 324: March 19, 2004

 

US soldiers kill journalist in Baghdad
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/30E895C5-79E1-4A46-B1A2-15F6C8A0E6B4.htm 

Iraqis began burying their dead from the Baghdad hotel attack

US occupation forces have shot dead al-Arabiya cameraman Ali Abd al-Aziz and injured two others working for the station in Baghdad. The Dubai-based satellite station reported Abd al-Aziz was killed late on Thursday near the Burj al-Hayat hotel in central Baghdad.  The television crew was filming the site after it came under rocket fire. US forces opened fire "randomly", reported the station. Its correspondent Ali al-Khatib was also injured and is reported by the station to be in a serious condition. A sound engineer, whose name was not revealed, was also hurt. At least 14 journalists have been killed since the US-led invasion of Iraq last year. read more
 

VOICES ON IRAQ

The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/voices/0,12811,880735,00.html 

In February 2003 we interviewed a selection of people with links to Iraq -anti-war protesters, Middle East experts, Iraqi refugees and politicians - to find out their views on the coming war. In May 2003 we talked to them again about the aftermath of the conflict. Now, a year on from the attacks on Iraq, we interviewed them for a third time to find out their hopes and fears for a post-Saddam Iraq. We will be publishing a selection of interviews every day this week in the run-up to the anniversary of the start of the conflict on Saturday, including Noam Chomsky, George Galloway, former weapons inspector Tim Trevan and former UN humanitarian coordinator for Iraq Hans von Sponeck. read more

 

Day 323: March 18, 2004

 

The Mount Lebanon Hotel was destroyed and 27 people killed when a car bomb exploded yesterday. J. Delay / AP

Car Bomb Kills Dozens In Baghdad
Hotel Attack Is Latest in Series Targeting Foreign Civilians
Sewell Chan, Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A1234-2004Mar17.html

A powerful car bomb ripped through a five-story hotel filled with foreign guests Wednesday evening, killing at least 27 people and destroying nearby apartment houses days before the anniversary of the start of the Iraq war. The 8:09 p.m. explosion at the Mount Lebanon Hotel, near Firdaus Square in central Baghdad, created a 20-foot-wide crater, ignited buildings, cars and trees and blew the window panes out of a hospital across the street. It was the latest and bloodiest in a wave of recent attacks on foreign civilians, eight of whom had been killed in the previous eight days.  read more
 

Last rites for the Bush doctrine?
Sidney Blumenthal, The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1171937,00.html 

When terrorist bombs exploded at Atocha train station in Madrid on March 11, a date that resonated like a European September 11, politics on both sides of the Atlantic were thrown into turmoil. The ruling conservative Popular party and the Bush administration instantly staked the Spanish election on the presumed identity of the terrorists.  The Spanish government had supported Bush's war in Iraq against the overwhelming opposition of Spanish public opinion. March 11, therefore, must not be September 11. The culprits must be Eta, not al-Qaida. The then prime minister, José Mariá Aznar, repeatedly called Spanish newspapers to insist that Eta was responsible. Within hours of the attack, George Bush and his secretary of state Colin Powell helpfully pointed their fingers at Eta. A day before the election, however, alleged terrorists linked to al-Qaida were arrested. The credibility of the government was in tatters and it suffered a shattering defeat.  read more

 

Day 322: March 17, 2004

 

Bush camp exposed as 'serial liars'
Reuters

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/78ED42F5-454D-4064-B788-8AB0948AE7CD.htm

US leadersmajor source for misinformation before war

US President George Bush and his four top advisers made a combined total of 237 misleading public statements on the threat posed by Iraq. The claim was made in a congressional report released on Tuesday.  Compiled by Democratic staff of the House Government Reform Committee, the report examined assertions made by Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of State Colin Powell and national security adviser Condoleezza Rice. The document was requested by California Representative Henry Waxman - the most senior Democrat on the committee and a tenacious critic of some of the contracts awarded to businesses to rebuild Iraq.   Report details: "Prior to the war in Iraq, the president and his advisers repeatedly claimed that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction that jeopardised the security of the United States. read more
 

Bush warms to new UN resolution on Iraq
The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1170844,00.html 
The White House was scrambling yesterday to keep its military coalition together after the Madrid bombings, with an offer to support a new UN mandate for keeping foreign troops in Iraq. "It's essential that we remain side-by-side with the Iraqi people," George Bush said. "Al-Qaida understands the stakes. Al-Qaida wants us out of Iraq because al-Qaida wants to use Iraq as an example of defeating freedom and democracy." His appeal for unity came after the incoming Spanish prime minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, pledged to pull his country's troops out of Iraq this summer if UN backing is not forthcoming. The Bush administration signalled that it was warming to the idea of a new resolution.  read more
 

Day 321: March 16, 2004

 

Across From White House  Iraq War Protesters Name Hundreds Lost
Manny Fernandez, Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61443-2004Mar15.html 

Vietnam veteran Bill Steyert of Queens, N.Y., gives a peace sign after trying to rush to the White House.  Photo: Robert A. Reeder

They read aloud the names of the dead, one by one. Standing on a box of a stage in the park across from the White House, a group of antiwar activists, veterans and military family members leaned into two microphones and called out the names of men and women they had never met. Some wiped tears from their eyes, and some simply stepped off the stage after they were done, hands in pockets and heads down. Vietnam veteran Bill Steyert read the name of Cedric Lennon, 32. Peace activist Jen Carr spoke the name of her friend Gregory E. MacDonald, 29. The names -- U.S. troops, coalition soldiers and Iraqis killed in the war and occupation of Iraq -- became a kind of antiwar chant, dragging on so long that organizers had to cut the readings short. There were 900 names total printed up on thick, white cards for the roughly 200 protesters gathered at Lafayette Square yesterday. read more

 

Three US relief workers killed in Iraq drive-by shooting
The Scotsman

http://news.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=304902004

Three United States relief workers were killed and two were wounded in a drive-by shooting yesterday in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, the US military said. Hospital officials said two of the dead were women. The victims, who have not been named, worked for a non-governmental organisation. Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Piek, a spokesman for US forces in Mosul, said the workers were travelling in one car on the eastern side of the city when they were attacked. An off-duty Iraqi policeman found the car shortly after the late afternoon shooting and took the wounded to hospital. US army air medevac helicopters later took them to a military hospital in Mosul. "One person is currently in surgery. The other is in the intensive care unit," said Lt Col Piek. Iraqi officials at al-Razi hospital in Mosul said one man and two women were killed. "All five US citizens belong to a private volunteer organisation. Coalition forces are working to contact the organisation. When appropriate next of kin notification is complete, more information will be provided," added Lt Col Piek.  read more
 

Day 320: March 15, 2004

 

IS U.S. Unloading WMD in IraQ?
Mehr News Agency
http://www.tehrantimes.com/Description.asp?Da=3/13/2004&Cat=4&Num=011 

Over the past few days, in the wake of the bombings in Karbala and the ideological disputes that delayed the signing of Iraq’s interim constitution, there have been reports that U.S. forces have unloaded a large cargo of parts for constructing long-range missiles and weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in the southern ports of Iraq.  A reliable source from the Iraqi Governing Council, speaking on condition of anonymity, told the Mehr News Agency that U.S. forces, with the help of British forces stationed in southern Iraq, had made extensive efforts to conceal their actions.  He added that the cargo was unloaded during the night as attention was still focused on the aftermath of the deadly bombings in Karbala and the signing of Iraq’s interim constitution.  read more

 

Journalists: "US authorities control and intimidate media in Iraq"
International Federation of Journalists
http://electroniciraq.net/news/1398.shtml 

The International Federation of Journalists today accused the US authorities in Iraq of attempting to "control and intimidate" the media, following the recent detention of several Korean journalists by the US forces in Baghdad. On 6 March, the US military in Iraq detained three Korean Broadcasting System (KBS) journalists for close to four hours on suspicion of carrying explosives. The journalists were all handcuffed and held in custody based on "internal regulations", despite the fact that the Korean Embassy in Iraq had confirmed their identifications and had called for their immediate release. "Such actions are absolutely unacceptable," said Aidan White, IFJ General Secretary. "It is very difficult not to interpret this as a direct attempt to intimidate the media."  After finding that there were no traces of explosives in their luggage and finally acknowledging that they were bona fide reporters covering the ongoing reconstruction process in Iraq, the journalists were eventually released.  read more

 

SILENCE AS British troops said to have killed 23 innocent Iraqis
Madeleine Bunting, The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1169300,00.html 
The names of Abdel Jabr Mousa or Baha Mousa have probably not lodged in your memory. Nor Hazim Jum'aa Gatteh Al-Skeini or Hanan Shmailawi. They are among the 23 Iraqi civilians alleged to have been killed by British troops since the end of hostilities. Seven cases are now being investigated by the Ministry of Defence, which has already paid out £15,375 in compensation. Abdel Jabr Mousa was the headmaster of a Basra primary school. British soldiers came to the family house looking for a neighbour, and when they found a Kalashnikov kept for self- protection (it is not illegal in Iraq), Abdel and his son Bashar were arrested. Abdel's body was later retrieved from Basra hospital, bruised and bloodied, but the death certificate gave only "heart attack" as cause of death.  read more

 

Day 319: March 14, 2004

 

Iraqis investigate Halliburton over allegations of bribery
Clayton Hirst, The Independent
http://www.endthewar.org/features/halliburton.htm 

Scandal-ridden Halliburton now under scrutiny from Iraq's governing council.

Iraq's Governing Council is investigating fraud claims against Halliburton, the US construction giant which has won the lion's share of contracts to rebuild the bombed-out country.  The probe centres on allegations that staff working for the Houston-based company took bribes for awarding sub-contracts in Iraq. In January the company, which was run by US Vice-President Dick Cheney between 1995 and 2000, sacked two employees over the allegations and reported the incident to the Pentagon.  In an exclusive interview with The Independent on Sunday, Iraq's minister of public works, Nasreen Berwari, said: "Members of the Iraqi Governing Council are posing questions. I am worried about any companies having such allegations. I am yet to hear what is the real story. I always look for the real story."  read more

 

Bombs Kill Six U.S. Soldiers in Iraq
Associated Press
http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-3859572,00.html 

Four American soldiers died in two bomb explosions in Baghdad, the coalition said Sunday, raising to six the number of U.S. forces killed in roadside bombs this weekend. Hundreds of Iraqis, meanwhile, mourned the death of a Shiite politician's relative in a bomb blast in his shop the previous day. A roadside bomb killed three soldiers from the 1st Armored Division and wounded another during a patrol Saturday night in southeastern Baghdad, a spokeswoman for the U.S.-led coalition spokeswoman said. That followed a similar attack in Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit that killed two American soldiers and wounded three others. U.S. forces responded by making several arrests and dispatching troops into the streets in a show of force on the same day that the 1st Infantry Division's 1st Battalion, 18th Infantry Regiment, took control of the restive Sunni Triangle town in a troop rotation. read more

 

Six Iraqis killed in attack on village
Al Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/53416CF3-92F0-47F9-8027-DCA875828181.htm

Six members of an Iraqi family have been killed and four children wounded when their village was fired on.  Family members on Sunday blamed US troops, saying soldiers had heard people shooting into the air on Saturday to celebrate a wedding nearby and had fired back from their tanks. The US military said it had no information about any incident in Zuham village near Miqdadiya, north of Baghdad.  "The attack happened at abour 2:30 p.m. (11:30 GMT), when the family was in the house," cousin Bashir Ata Allah Salih said.  "The first shell landed in a nearby shop, and the next one inside the house. Two children were blown into pieces. There were five killed and five wounded."  read more

 

Day 318: March 13, 2004

 

Fears of Iraqi religious war abound
Lorne Cook, Middel East Online

http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/iraq/?id=9234 

Hundreds of Iraqi Sunnis gather at Baghdad mosque to pay respect to Imam Obeidi gunned down Monday.

Fears of a religious war between Iraq's Sunni and Shiite Muslim communities were palpable Friday as hundreds of worshippers, some of them armed, gathered at a Baghdad mosque to pay tribute to a slain cleric.  Dozens of guards, their faces wrapped in headscarves, and a US military team stood tense watch, as worshippers were searched at the entrance to the Findi al-Kubaiysi mosque, its wall scarred with bullet and shrapnel marks.  US officials say Imam Ali Hussein Hassan al-Obedi was gunned down on a nearby street Monday by four men in a brown BMW vehicle. No clear leads have emerged from the investigation so far.  But people who came Friday to the Sunni mosque to pay their respects in this predominantly Shiite quarter of Shorta al-Hamsi spoke of a campaign by foreigners to covertly ignite a civil war between the two communities.  One worshipper was gunned down in his home near the mosque on Wednesday. On Thursday a security guard was killed when a grenade was tossed toward the entrance from a passing car, people here said.  read more

 

So now we know: torture routinely used by the US in Guantánamo Bay
Ken Coates, The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1168452,00.html 
Truly we live in dark times. A sure sign that the nights are getting longer, even as springtime approaches, comes from the intensity of anxieties about torture. All the time there are reports of new atrocities - in Sudan, among British victims in Saudi Arabia, and of course in the war on terror. Later this month in Geneva, the World Organisation Against Torture will tell the UN Commission on Human Rights that "since the attacks of September 11, numerous states have adopted or announced measures that are incompatible with their obligations under international law". At the same time that we face new atrocities in Madrid, we hear the voices of the first Britons released from Guantánamo Bay where, according to former detainee Jamal al-Harith, they endured a regime of unremitting cruelty.   He describes systematic humiliation, clearly aimed at corroding the humanity of the victims, and which included exposing devout Muslims to insult by prostitutes. The Centre for the Rehabilitation of Victims of Torture in Copenhagen was the first to provide systematic medical care for torture victims, and to research its effects. "We thought that the aim of torture was to obtain information," states the centre's Dr Inge Genefke. "But no. The main aim of torture is to break down, to destroy the identity, the personality." read more

 

Day 317: March 12, 2004

 

Spain mourns as death toll mounts

ABC News Online

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/s1065023.htm 

A woman comforts on injured man on the streets of Madrid.

Larger rallies are planned across Spain on Friday as the country mourns the 198 people killed and more than 1,400 wounded by coordinated bomb blasts in Madrid on Thursday. The atrocity, which Spanish media and officials described as "our own September 11", came just three days before general elections that the ruling conservative Popular Party is widely expected to win.  Three days of national mourning have been declared.  Hundreds of thousands of people are expected to take to the streets of Spain later today in anti-terrorism peace marches.  Spain said on Friday that the death toll was 198 killed and that 1,430 people wounded, up from the previous 192 dead and 1,421 injured.  The carnage, carried out in four trains and three railway stations in the southeast of the capital in morning rush-hour, was the worst terror attack in Europe since the 1988 Lockerbie bombing that killed 270 people. In Madrid and throughout Spain, people took to central squares to hold protests against terrorism.  read more
 

Iraq: 2 US soldiers killed

Al Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/9E5480CE-A7C9-45F5-8794-29CF23E5E561.htm 
Two US occupation soldiers have been killed in volatile Iraq after their vehicle hit a roadside bomb.  A statement from the US Central Command said another soldier was wounded in the blast that hit their convoy at Habbaniyah, 60km west of capital Baghdad. The soldiers were from the First Brigade Combat Team of Task Force All American. The attack came on a day when Iraqi police detained six police officers suspected of involvement in Tuesday's killing of two US government employees in Karbala.  "They are from our police department. They are suspected of being involved. The case is under investigation, but they are innocent until proved guilty," Karbala police spokesman Rahman Al-Mussawi Diab told AFP.  read more
 

Day 316: March 11, 2004

American citizen charged with spying for Saddam Hussein's Iraqi government
Larry Neumeister, Associated Press
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/world/iraq/20040311-0740-iraq-spycase.html 
An American citizen was arrested Thursday on charges she acted as an Iraqi spy before and after the U.S. invasion of Iraq, accepting $10,000 for her work, prosecutors said Thursday. Susan Lindauer, 41, was arrested in her hometown of Takoma Park, Md., and was to appear in court later in the day in Baltimore, authorities in New York said.   She was accused of conspiring to act as a spy for the Iraqi Intelligence Service and with engaging in prohibited financial transactions involving the government of Iraq under dictator Saddam Hussein.  read more

US planning 'firm' sanctions on Syria
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/5761F664-FC91-4AB7-9372-5BB85ED4D52F.htm 

Burns (R) says Syria has made no attempt to "reform"

The Bush administration will act soon to impose firm sanctions against Syria which it accuses of sponsoring terrorism, according to a US State Department official.  William Burns, the assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, confirmed the move to a committee in the House of Representatives on Wednesday. He said: "I think you'll see the implementation very shortly, and I think it will be a very firm implementation of the Syrian Accountability Act and the intent behind it."  Lawmakers have pressured President George Bush since November to impose penalties on Syria, which Washington also accuses of occupying Lebanon and failing to secure its border with Iraq while allowing anti-American fighters to make their way there.  

read more
 

 

Discredited Iraqi exiles still land US spy funds
Questions over $340,000 per month payouts
Tabassum Zakaria, Reuters

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1166966,00.html 
$340,000 (£190,000) a month for intelligence about insurgents and other matters, US officials said yesterday.   Mr Chalabi, a former exile and now a member of the Iraqi governing council, pushed for years for the US to topple Saddam Hussein. Before the war, his group directed numerous Iraqi defectors to the US to provide intelligence from inside Iraq that critics now say was largely spun to alarm Washington into taking action against Baghdad.  Internal reports revealed that much of the information from the INC was either fabricated or useless.   read more

 

New tactic heightens terror fear in Iraq

2 American civilians are killed by gunmen dressed as policemen
John Burns, New York Times

http://www.iht.com/articles/509715.html 
ABU GHARIK, Iraq Two American civilians working for the Coalition Provisional Authority and an Iraqi interpreter were killed by what Iraqi police officials said Wednesday they believed were four men dressed as Iraqi police officers.  The civilians and the interpreter were driving down from the holy city of Karbala in an unmarked, unprotected vehicle at 6:20 p.m. Tuesday when four men who had been following them opened fire at point-blank range, the police sai.  The car, which was traveling on a divided highway, crossed over the median strip, crashed down an embankment and then ran across open ground until it hit an earth banking, where it came to rest.  read more

 

Day 315: March 10, 2004

 

CIA: Pentagon lied in run-up to war
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/09A59841-7C86-4E31-9962-91F00CE4CB0B.htm

CIA director George Tenet has revealed that a senior defence official leaked a false intelligence report before the US-led invasion of Iraq, ignoring agency advice.  Answering questions before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday, Tenet confirmed that an article in November's Weekly Standard was written by Undersecretary of Defence for Policy Douglas Feith.  The magazine claimed to have obtained a leaked top-secret document, but the CIA chief admitted the third highest Pentagon official wrote it specifically for publication.  Vice President Dick Cheney then cited the leaked unapproved document as "the best source of information" on cooperation between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida.  read more

US soldier killed, three injured in Iraqi ambush
UN aid team makes brief foray into southern areas
Bahrain Tribune

http://www.bahraintribune.com/ArticleDetail.asp?CategoryId=2&ArticleId=24881 

US  tank passes by a truck damaged by a roadside bomb, apparently intended for US military convoys, in Baghdad yesterday. The truck driver was killed. – AP

A US soldier was killed and three others wounded yesterday in an ambush on the Baghdad airport highway, witnesses said.  The witnesses said unknown assailants hurled an explosive device at a US patrol on the highway, killing one soldier immediately and wounding three others.  US coalition headquarters did not confirm the incident.  Meanwhile an Iraqi civilian died yesterday after being shot by US soldiers near the city of Habbaniya, 40 kilometres west of Baghdad, witnesses said.  The death brought to 380 the number of US soldiers killed in action since the US invaded Iraq.   The witnesses said the 52-year-old man was driving towards a checkpoint manned by US soldiers when shots from their direction hit him. The man died shortly after arriving at hospital in Fallujah.  read more
 

Shia clerics warn of civil war, fears in constitution
Scotsman.com

http://news.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=276682004 

Shiite leaders warned yesterday that Iraq’s new constitution could cause problems in the long term, with one senior cleric saying a clause on federalism had the potential to provoke civil war.  Shiite politicians said they would respect the document signed on Monday, which they described as a major achievement, but stressed they would find ways in the future to undo the elements they were still unhappy with.   The main clause Shiites object to is one they fear will enable Kurds to veto a permanent constitution to be written next year if it does not enshrine their demands for autonomy.  read more

 

Day 314: March 9, 2004

 

Premature rejoicing in Kirkuk
Peter Beaumont, The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1165163,00.html 
The Kurdish population of Kirkuk took to the streets yesterday to declare the city had been in effect returned to Kurdistan, after decades of ravages by Saddam Hussein's regime, by the signing of the new interim constitution. In an apparently spontaneous demonstration tens of thousands marched wrapped in the Kurdish flag or banging drums, or blocked the streets as they waved flags and fired in the air from cars and buses. On the main road beneath the castle, overcrowded trucks with young men hanging from the back and sides sped by, many bearing pictures of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan leader Jalal Talabani, whose stronghold is an hour away in Sulaimaniya.  read more

 

Stressed out U.S. troops hitting booze and smokes hard
Associated Press
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/World/Iraq/2004/03/09/375096-ap.html 
Stressed out and afraid to seek help is the admitted state of mind of many U.S. troops and Pentagon officials said they intend to look harder to find the reasons.   In a survey conducted for the Pentagon of troops stationed at home and around the world, 32 per cent reported feeling "a lot" of work-related stress. Almost one-half said they believed their careers would probably or definitely be damaged if they sought mental health counselling.   The survey, whose results were released Monday, also found cigarette smoking and heavy drinking are on the rise in the military. Use of illicit drugs is holding steady, however, far below the rate for civilians.   "A sizable group experienced problems in the areas of stress and mental health, which suggests the need for more attention to these issues," a summary of the survey results said.  read more
 

Day 313: March 8, 2004

 

US condemned for Afghan 'abuses'
Andrew North, BBC
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/3541839.stm 

Rights Groups oppose the use of helicopter gunships

The actions of US military and intelligence units in Afghanistan have been heavily criticised in a new report by an international human rights group.  US-based Human Rights Watch accuses US personnel of using excessive force, carrying out arbitrary detentions and mistreating people in custody.  Washington keeps about 9,000 troops on Afghan soil, involved primarily in fighting the Taleban and al-Qaeda.  But the human rights body says many US actions violate international law.  The report is damming. Entitled Enduring Freedom - Abuses by US Forces in Afghanistan, it focuses on the American system of detaining people at bases across the country, which it describes as "almost entirely outside the rule of law".  read more

Shias 'to sign Iraq constitution'
BBC
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3541875.stm 
Shia members of the US-appointed Iraqi Governing Council have pledged to back an interim constitution when the body meets again on Monday.  A signing ceremony has been delayed twice, first by bomb attacks and then last-minute doubts among the Shias.  They say they still have reservations, but those can be addressed later.  About 10 rockets were fired into the centre of Baghdad on Sunday, near to the building where the charter signing ceremony is set to take place.  The attacks appeared to target the heavily fortified headquarters of the US-led coalition in control of Iraq.  Some hit the al-Rashid hotel where a number of senior officials are based.  Fires broke out but no-one was reported to be seriously hurt. read more

 

Day 312: March 7, 2004

 

British troops kill three Iraqis
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/A1F47DDE-4936-4AA7-B7D9-FA7155825A85.htm 

Occupation forces claim they came under fire first

British occupation troops have shot dead three Iraqis in a gunfight, which also left seven of its own soldiers wounded. It was not immediately clear, though, whether the killed Iraqis were resistance fighters or innocent bystanders and a British military spokeswoman said an investigation had been ordered to ascertain the truth.  The spokeswoman said the firefight took place in the village of Oal at Sahil in southeast Iraq after a routine British patrol came under fire.
"Three Iraqis were shot dead and an investigation is now under way," a spokeswoman said.  read more
 

10 coalition soldiers hurt; Shiites continue talks with leader on interim constitution
Khaleej Times Online

http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticle.asp?xfile=data/focusoniraq/2004/March/focusoniraq_March35.xml&section=focusoniraq 
BAGHDAD - US soldiers opened fire on a truck packed with explosives, killing the driver, and three Americans were wounded when the truck crashed on a bridge. Meanwhile, politicians conferred on Sunday with Iraq’s top Shiite cleric to resolve a dispute that held up the signing of the interim constitution.  In Washington, US officials said a team of 50 Justice Department prosecutors, investigators and support staff will go to Iraq to assemble war crimes cases against Saddam Hussein and others in his former regime.  read more
 

Day 311: March 6, 2004

 

US army admits killing Iraqi civilians
Occupation soldiers are accused of being heavy-handed

Al Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/4A98C6FE-DB69-4F83-8CAE-F709B8E60340.htm 

Basma Awwad was wounded in attack that killed her brother in February (Al Jazeera)

The US occupation army has admitted killing four civilians in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk two days ago.  Major Josslyn Aberle, the spokeswoman for the 4th Infantry Division, on Friday said that the four were killed on Wednesday during clashes between occupation troops and Iraqi resistance fighters.  Those killed were relatives of resistance fighters the US soldiers were seeking to detain, she claimed. The circumstances of the deaths were being investigated, she added.  read more

 

Outline of Iraq's new temporary constitution
AFP

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/03/05/1078464649266.html?from=storyrhs 

Iraq's Governing Council was due to sign an interim constitution last night (AEDT) to guide the country to sovereignty and elections, as US forces hunted a man they say is behind the deadliest attacks since Saddam Hussein's fall.  The law was expected to be signed by the 25-member US-appointed council at 4pm (midnight AEDT), but the ceremony was delayed yet again.  Iraq's temporary constitution will take effect from July 1 and last until a permanent charter is drawn up by a new parliament directly elected by the people before the end of January 2005. Comprising some 64 articles split into nine chapters, the basic law will take effect after the US-led coalition hands back sovereignty to a caretaker Iraqi government on June 30. read more

 

Day 310: March 5, 2004

 

Shiites won't sign interim constitution
Hamza Hendawi, Associated Press

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apus_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq 

A table with 25 pens lying idle in the middle of the lobby of the Convention Center  (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)

A table with 25 pens to be used by an equal number of members of the Iraqi Governing Council and an empty chair lying idle in the middle of the lobby of the Convention Center for the historic new Iraqi interim Constitution on Friday March 5, 2004 in Baghdad, Iraq. The signing ceremony has been postponed to give time for the members to consult prominent Shiite leader Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Shiite leaders refused to sign an interim constitution after Iraq's top Shiite cleric rejected portions of the charter, in a last-minute dispute that wrecked a planned signing ceremony Friday and marred a landmark in the U.S. plans to hand over sovereignty to the Iraqis.  A spokesman for one of the Shiite parties said no signing would take place before Monday, giving time for members to consult with Shiite Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani - who has already forced two major revisions in U.S. plans to transfer power to the Iraqis.  read more
 

Day 309: March 4, 2004

 

In Karbala and Baghdad, they mourned the dead. Throughout Iraq, they blamed the US

By Justin Huggler in Baghdad, The Independent
http://www.endthewar.org/features/mourning.htm 
They began burying the dead in Iraq yesterday. Vast crowds gathered in Karbala and Baghdad, where on Tuesday their fellow Shia were cut down in a series of bombings and mortar attacks. Many in the crowds yesterday shouted slogans against the Americans, who have been blamed almost universally by the Shia for the disastrous security situation in Iraq which led to Tuesday's massacres.  In Karbala, they carried 12 or so coffins through the same streets where the screaming victims ran in panic as explosion after explosion went off around them a day before. They were draped with verses from the Koran and flowers.  There were only 12 coffins because, so far, they have only been able to bury those whose body parts they have been able to piece together from the carnage. And as they sifted through the remains, the death toll rose. The head of the United States-appointed Governing Council put the combined death toll from Karbala and Baghdad at 271 yesterday. The Health Minister put it at 169; the Americans said it was 117. The truth is that nobody really knows how many people died.  read more

 

Iraq's Shiites Renew Call For Militias
Armed Men on Guard Day After Shrine Attacks
Rajiv Chandrasekaran, Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A28577-2004Mar3.html 

Mourners hold a vigil at the site of bombings Tuesday (Sarah L. Voisin -- The Washington Post)

Rifle-toting Shiite Muslim militiamen, some in crisp uniforms and others in civilian attire, deployed in force Wednesday around a bomb-scarred shrine in Baghdad, setting up dozens of checkpoints on bustling streets devoid of U.S. soldiers and Iraqi police officers. The militiamen, loyal to various Shiite political parties, joined a contingent of armed guards from the Imam Kadhim mausoleum in asserting control over the neighborhood surrounding the gold-domed shrine, which was attacked by three suicide bombers on Tuesday morning as tens of thousands of Shiites gathered to commemorate a religious holiday. read more
 

Day 308: March 3, 2004

 

Iraq in state of mourning after bomb attacks leave more than 180 dead
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/47DAE710-B001-4374-AFAD-289055CD3836.htm

Moments after, people stand among the victims in Karbala, Iraq.   (AP Photo/B. Linsley)

A benumbed Iraq, shocked and shaken by Tuesday's string of bomb attacks in Karbala and Baghdad, is observing three-days of mourning.  Amid an outpouring of rage and grief over the death of 180 people in the coordinated blasts, Iraqi leaders called for calm, patience and unity in the face of the gravest of provocations.  "These sick people with guns are seeking to start sectarian strife so they can consolidate their positions," Adel Abdel Mehdi of the main Shia party, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) said. "Their aim is to stop Iraqis from winning their sovereignty," he said.  read more
 

The inspector's final report
Julian Border, The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1160916,00.html 
When chief weapons inspector David Kay bluntly told the senate there were, in fact, no WMDs, he forced a humiliating U-turn in Washington and London. Now, in his first newspaper interview, he tells Julian Borger that the president must admit he got it wrong . When David Kay walked into the US Senate in late January, the question of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction had become entangled in a thick forest of evasions, euphemisms and elisions. George Bush's administration and Tony Blair's government insisted that some evidence of weapons had been found by the Iraq Survey Group (ISG), which Kay had led for seven months, and that much more would be uncovered. At the same time, some US officials were market testing a new line - that the administration had never claimed there were Iraqi weapons stockpiles in the first place, just weapons programmes.  Kay sat down in front of the Senate microphone on January 28, and with a few blunt words, swept all that carefully calibrated verbiage away. "Let me begin by saying, we were almost all wrong, and I certainly include myself here," he told the open-mouthed senators. It was a mea culpa - he had been convinced since his days as a UN inspector that Saddam Hussein was concealing a potentially devastating arsenal - but it was much more than that.  read more
 

Day 307: March 2, 2004

 

At least 100 killed in Iraq explosions
Guardian/Agencies
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1160119,00.html 

A woman and child injured in a bomb blast in Kerbala

At least 100 people were reported killed today after a series of apparently choreographed blasts struck Shia Muslim shrines in Baghdad and Kerbala at the height of the major Ashura religious festival. In the Iraqi capital, three explosions rocked the inside and outside of the Kazimiya shrine after 10am local time (07.00 GMT). A hospital official told Reuters at least 75 people had died.  At around the same time in Kerbala, 80km (50 miles) south of Baghdad, there were five blasts near two of Shia Islam's most important shrines. Arab television stations reported 25 dead but later unconfirmed reports from the AFP news agency suggested the death toll could be at least 50. read more
 

Kerry’s Support for the Invasion of Iraq and the Bush Doctrine Still Unexplained
Stephen Zunes, Common Dreams
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0301-01.htm 
As casualties mount and disorder continues in Iraq, and as the lies that were put forward to garner support of the invasion are exposed, Massachusetts senator John Kerry and his supporters have desperately sought to defend his decision to back the U.S. invasion and occupation. Their failure to make a convincing case may spell trouble for Senator Kerry’s dreams of capturing the White House in November.   read more
 

Day 306: March 1, 2004

 

UK's MoD ‘lied’ over depleted uranium
Army advises troops in Iraq of health risk but insists Scottish firing range is safe, despite growing international concern
Neil Mackay and Amy Wilson, Sunday Herald
http://www.sundayherald.com/40306

A war-damaged Iraqi tank rests along the highway next to a school on the outskirts of Baghdad. Depleted uranium weapons were used in populated areas in Iraq. (August 04, 2003) Photo Credit: Dan DeLong/Seattle Post-Intelligencer

CLAIMS by the Ministry of Defence that depleted uranium (DU) is not a risk to life have been undermined by a Sunday Herald investigation that found the British army is telling soldiers in Iraq that it can cause ill-health.  The revelation has outraged the military, scientists and politicians. Studies have shown DU leads to cancers, birth defects, memory loss, damage to the immune system and neuro-psychotic disorders. But the MoD has claimed since the first Gulf war that “DU does not pose a risk to health or the environment”.  However, military sources have passed an MoD card to the Sunday Herald which is being handed to troops on active service in Iraq. It reads: “You have been deployed to a theatre where depleted uranium (DU) munitions have been used. DU is a weakly radioactive heavy metal which has the potential to cause ill-health. You may have been exposed to dust containing DU during your deployment.  read more
 

Iraqi Council Agrees on Terms of Interim Constitution
Rajiv Chandrasekaran, Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A17535-2004Feb29.html 

BAGHDAD, March 1 -- Iraqi political leaders agreed early Monday on the terms of an interim constitution that strikes a compromise on the contentious issues of Kurdish autonomy and Islam's role in government.   The country's 25-member, U.S.-appointed Governing Council reached consensus on the 63rd and final article of the document at 4:20 a.m. local time, after more than 10 hours of almost nonstop negotiations mediated by the American administrator of Iraq, L. Paul Bremer, people involved in the meeting said.   read more
 

FEBRUARY 2004

 

Day 305: February 29, 2004

 

US appointed council members have been working day and night

Iraqi Constitution: No signing before Wednesday
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/92D0EC02-66C7-4EEE-A9F9-DD09B5EA11D7.htm 
US-appointed Iraqi leaders drawing up a temporary constitution are to hold off on signing it formally into law until Wednesday after the end of a Shia religious holiday."  They have decided that it would be inappropriate to hold a signing ceremony before the end of Ashura," a senior US-led occupation official said on Sunday.  The official was referring to the religious holiday marking the death of prophet's Muhammad grandson al-Husayn in the 7th century.  read more

 

UK Army chiefs feared Iraq war illegal just days before start
Martin Bright, Antony Barnett and Gaby Hinsliff, the Observer
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/iraq/story/0,12239,1158859,00.html 
Britain's Army chiefs refused to go to war in Iraq amid fears over its legality just days before the British and American bombing campaign was launched, The Observer can today reveal.
The explosive new details about military doubts over the legality of the invasion are detailed in unpublished legal documents in the case of Katharine Gun, the intelligence officer dramatically freed last week after Lord Goldsmith, the Attorney-General, dropped charges against her of breaking the Official Secrets Act. read more
 

Iraqi intellectuals under siege
Amal Hamdan, Al Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/48D3105B-C3BA-4B82-A01C-D8D05892A36D.htm 

Many intellectuals like al-Rawi have been murdered

Grief physically overwhelms Dr Bushra al-Rawi. Months after Dr Muhammad al-Rawi was murdered, she wishes her husband had taken the threats on his life more seriously.  The night of 27 July 2003 is painfully clear in Bushra's memory. Two men entered the private clinic of the doctor, who was the president of Baghdad University.  One of them feigned severe stomach pain and was doubled over. Concealed against his stomach was a gun with which he shot al-Rawi. The father of three died instantly.   The dead man's name was on an ominous list naming professors, intellectuals and academics marked for assassination after the US-led occupation of Iraq.  read more
 

Day 304: February 28, 2004

 

Divisions over Islam delay moves towards sovereignty
Michael Howard in Baghdad, The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1158119,00.html 

Today's deadline for finalising Iraq's interim constitution, which is to underwrite the transition to full sovereignty, will not be met, senior officials said yesterday. The committee drafting the transitional administrative law is split over issues such as the role of Islam and the powers of the federal region proposed by the Kurds in the north. There are also differences on the representation of women in the assembly and the form and function of the presidency, officials said. "There are many important points still to be resolved," said Mahmoud Othman, an independent Kurdish member of the governing council who sits on the drafting committee. "I don't think we can meet the Americans' deadline. It needs more time."   read more
 

Day 303: February 27, 2004

 

Iraqi Experts Tossed With The Water
Iraqi Workers Ineligible To Fix Polluted Systems
Ariana Eunjung Cha, Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A10640-2004Feb26.html 
 

Subcontractors for Bechtel National Inc. construct a foundation for a water treatment tank.

BAGHDAD -- With nearly 40 years of civil engineering service under his belt, Sabah Al-Ani is among Iraq's top experts in water treatment. He kept the country's systems up and running through countless floods and droughts, years of economic sanctions and three wars.  After bombings and looting sprees left the water network in worse shape than ever, Al-Ani prepared to help out once again. But a directive from the U.S.-led occupation authority locked him out of the reconstruction process.  read more

 

UN OUTRAGED AS BLAIR ACCUSED OF BUGGING THE UN
The Guardian
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/iraq/story/0,12956,1157547,00.html 
The UN expressed outrage yesterday after an extraordinary claim by the former cabinet minister Clare Short that British intelligence services were involved in bugging the private office of its secretary general, Kofi Annan.   Mr Annan's team, after speaking to the British ambassador at the UN, launched an inquiry into the legal implications of the alleged bugging. "We want this action to stop, if indeed it has been carried out," said Mr Annan's spokesman, Fred Eckhard. "It is not good for the United Nations' work and it is illegal."  It is believed to be unprecedented for covert action to have been taken against the UN secretary general.   Ms Short, the former international development secretary, delivered her blow to Tony Blair while Downing Street was still reeling from the collapse of the court case against Katharine Gun, the GCHQ officer-turned-whistleblower. read more
 

Day 302: February 26, 2004
 

US chopper crashes in western Iraq, 2 killed
Reuters

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/02/26/1077676844642.html 

A US Kiowa reconnaissance helicopter crashed in western Iraq today, killing the two crew on board.   The US Army said mechanical problems rather than hostile fire had probably brought the aircraft down.   Witnesses in the town of Haditha, 200 kms northwest of Baghdad on the highway to the Syrian border, said the helicopter hit overhead power cables and crashed into a river.   The Kiowa is an observation and light attack helicopter that carries a crew of two.   Guerrilla attacks have brought down several US helicopters since the invasion of Iraq last year.   In  and light attack helicopter that carries a crew of two.   Guethe deadliest incident, 17 US soldiers were killed last November when two US Black Hawk helicopters collided and crashed in the city of Mosul after coming under fire.  --end story--

 

US soldiers kill top Zarqawi aide

AFP
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/02/25/1077676828371.html 
US forces announced they killed an aide to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi - suspected of being Osama bin Laden's chief operative in Iraq - as 30 religious and political leaders signed an agreement to promote harmony among the country's multiple ethnic groups.   US Army Major General Charles Swannack, commander of the 82nd Airborne Division, said that his troops raided a "terrorist safehouse" belonging to the Jordanian-born Zarqawi in the town of Al-Ramadi, located west of Baghdad.   Zarqawi, a suspected al-Qaeda terror group operative, has a $US10 million ($12.85 million) bounty on his head. He is the prime suspect behind deadly bombings in Iraq's holy city of Najaf and at the UN offices in Baghdad.   Soldiers hit the site on February 19, killed one of his operatives and arrested others, he said.   A senior US military coalition officer, Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, identified the slain man as Abu Mohammed Hamza, an explosives expert and one of "Zarqawi's lieutenants".  read more
 

Day 301: February 25, 2004

 

Iraqi poll next year, says Annan
Caroline Overington, Sydney Morning Herald

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/02/24/1077594831221.html 

Annan, right, leaves the White House after meeting with President Bush in the Oval Office, Tuesday, Feb. 3, 2004.

The United Nations Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, says the world body is ready to help Iraq  hold elections "in the not too distant future" - perhaps early next year - after the handover by the US-led coalition on June 30.  "We need to find a mechanism, working of course with the Iraqis, helping the Iraqis determine a mechanism for establishing an interim or transitional government so that the transfer of power . . . will go ahead," Mr Annan said in Tokyo after a meeting with Japan's Prime Minister, Junichiro Koizumi.  The US and the UN say elections by the end of June are impossible, partly for security reasons, and are looking at options for establishing a provisional government.  Mr Annan was also speaking after the release of a UN report which said it would impossible to hold elections in Iraqi before early next year, even if preparations began immediately.  The assessment is a blow to leading Muslim clerics in Iraq who want the US to organise direct elections as soon as possible.  read more
 

Iraqi unrest claims senior policeman
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/D714A281-2ABD-4595-8633-59C0607048C0.htm 
Unknown attackers have shot dead a top police officer and a former member of ousted President Saddam Hussein's ruling Baath party in separate incidents in northern Iraq.  Meanwhile, US and Iraqi soldiers in Baghdad detained about 20 people suspected of posing a "security threat" in a large operation near the health ministry, a military official said on Wednesday.   Police General Hikmat Mahmud Muhammad was shot dead by three men in a car as he left his home at 7:30am (04:30 GMT) in Mosul, 370km north of the capital, said Lieutenant Colonel Abd al-Azil Hazim Khafudi.  read more

 

Bullets claim stirs Iraq equipment row
Matthew Taylor, The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1155599,00.html 
A serving soldier reignited the row about equipment shortages during the Iraq war last night, claiming he and his men had been issued with just five bullets each for the entire conflict.
The unnamed soldier, who said he came under fire several times on the frontline in southern Iraq, told Channel 4 News: "We had five rounds each to defend ourselves. I actually crossed the border with five rounds.   "The magazine held 30 separate bullets but I was issued with five separate bullets to last the entire hostilities of the war. We came under fire in Um Qasr three or four times. Not fire, it was more like ricochets."   The soldier's claims reopen the debate on equipment shortages in the army. Last month, the defence secretary, Geoff Hoon, faced calls to resign following the death of Sergeant Steven Roberts, who was killed after being ordered to hand his flak jacket to another unit because there were not enough to go around. read more

Day 300: February 24, 2004

 

US soldiers suspended in abuse probe

Reuters

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/E5D03FBD-A648-4569-85E9-A87EF4D0D7E0.htm 
 

The US is holding up to 10,000 Iraqi prisoners of war

Seventeen US soldiers have been suspended after occupation forces in Iraq launched an investigation into mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners.  The US army said on Monday that a battalion commander and a company commander were among the suspended soldiers who worked at a prison west of Baghdad.  "We can confirm that 17 personnel have been suspended from duty pending the outcome of the investigation," a US military spokesman said.  read more

 

Rumsfeld assesses security as bomb kills 13
Reuters

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/02/23/1077497513560.html 
US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has flown into Iraq to gauge security risks ahead of a handover of power to Iraqis amid an insurgency highlighted by a fresh suicide bombing.  Mr Rumsfeld, making his fourth visit to Iraq since last year's US-led invasion, was greeted at Baghdad airport by US administrator Paul Bremer.  Protected by tight security, he immediately began meetings in the Baghdad area with senior US officers leading more than 100,000 troops in the country.  Mr Rumsfeld may ask whether Iraqi police and security forces will be able to take over more security responsibilities from US soldiers after a handover of power to Iraqis on June 30.  read more

 

Day 299: February 23, 2004

 

Kirkuk bomb kills seven police officers
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/37E06E74-9A97-4A29-AE96-FF4D5ACFAB14.htm 

arms and legs were strewn across the pavement

Two human bombers have blown up a car in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk killing seven police officers. The bombers blew up an explosives-laden car at a police station in a Kurdish neighbourhood of the oil-rich city of Kirkuk on Monday killing seven officers and wounding 35 others, police and medical sources said. Dr Hashim Muhammad of Azadi hospital said the two bombers were also incinerated by the blast, while most of the 35 wounded were seriously hurt.  read more
 

February bloodiest month for Iraqis
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/7C75D949-17A8-4F70-A984-A0CF571D918B.htm 

At least 250 Iraqis were killed in February, making it the bloodiest month in Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein, the interior ministry has said.  "February was the deadliest month in Iraq because you had more than 250 Iraqis killed, most of them from the police," interior ministry spokesman General Raad al-Naimi said on Monday. In the latest violence, two bombers rammed an explosives-packed white Oldsmobile on Monday morning into a police station in the ethnic tinderbox city of Kirkuk in northern Iraq, killing at least seven policemen and wounding dozens.  read more
 

Day 298: February 22, 2004

 

The hidden victims of Iraq's war
Amal Hamdan, Al Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/0C4E500E-495F-412F-9102-3C8822F6769B.htm 

Dr Naaman Ali: Iraq is a multi-wounded nation

One hidden toll of the US occupation of Iraq lies in Baghdad’s psychiatric hospitals. Away from the media spotlight, Iraqis with mental health problems have suffered under sanctions and now face fresh complications.  For almost a quarter of a century Iraqis have faced conflict: a bloody war with neighbouring Iran from 1980 until 1988: a US-led international coalition bombardment to oust Iraqi troops from Kuwait a few years later; thirteen years of crippling UN-imposed sanctions. And now occupation soldiers patrolling Baghdad.  read more

 

Bremer sees polls at least one year away
Reuters

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/02/21/1077072899465.html 

Bremer: in charge for another year?

The US administrator in Iraq has said it will not be possible to hold elections for a year to 15 months, putting him at odds with the country's most powerful religious leader who has insisted any delay must be brief.  Paul Bremer, speaking in an interview with the Dubai-based Al Arabiya television channel, said Iraq needed time to prepare for elections.  "These technical problems will take time to fix - we estimate somewhere between a year to 15 months ... There are real important technical problems why elections are not possible," Bremer said in excerpts of the interview broadcast yesterday.  "Iraq has no election law; it has no national commission to even establish a national law governing political parties; it has no voters' lists; it has not had a credible, reliable census for almost 20 years," he said. "There are no constituent boundaries to decide where elections would take place." read more
 

Red Cross visits Saddam
AFP
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/02/22/1077384619063.html 
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) visited deposed Iraqi president Saddam Hussein today as the country's US overseer said technical headaches could delay direct elections by more than a year.  "Two ICRC representatives, including a doctor, visited Saddam Hussein Saturday in Iraq and were able to stay with him long enough for a physical and mental evaluation," ICRC spokeswoman Nada Dumani said.  "In accordance with its rules, the ICRC is unable to give any indication about the condition of Saddam Hussein," she added.  US forces captured the former dictator on December 13 hiding in a hole on a farm in a village close to his hometown of Tikrit, north of Baghdad.  Another Red Cross spokesman in Amman, Muin Kassis, told AFP the humanitarian organisation aimed to deliver a written message from Saddam to his family.  read more

 

Sunni cleric killed in Iraq
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/228043E0-343A-4751-8CD0-F312BC052E2D.htm 
A spokesman of the Association of Muslim Scholars said Sheikh Dhamer al-Dhari was walking down a street near his mosque when gunmen opened fire from a car, killing him.  Al-Dhari was not a prominent member of the association, but his half brother serves as the organisation's secretary-general.  read more

 

Day 297: February 21, 2004

 

UK Troops accused on Iraq killings
Richard Norton-Taylor, The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1153028,00.html 

UK's MoD faces lawsuits over deaths of 18 civilians

The Ministry of Defence is facing the prospect of a string of lawsuits over the deaths of at least 18 Iraqi civilians allegedly killed by British soldiers, the Guardian can reveal.  The incidents, hitherto unreported, are separate from the suspicious deaths of seven Iraqis who were being held by British troops in the notorious Camp Bucca detention centre near the port of Umm Qasr, south of Basra. The threat of legal action comes as the conduct of British troops serving in southern Iraq is under intense scrutiny, with MPs and human rights lawyers demanding independent inquiries into the deaths at the prison camp as well as civilian fatalities in and around Basra.

read more

 

US soldier wounded in attack on convoy
Al Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/228043E0-343A-4751-8CD0-F312BC052E2D.htm 
A bomb blast has wounded at least one US soldier travelling in a convoy with thousands of troops, a US officer said.  A US military helicopter evacuated the Fourth Infantry Division (4ID) soldier after a roadside explosion hit his convoy on Friday just south of Balad, about 75 kilometres north of Baghdad, Major Douglas Babb told AFP.  Separately, a US military spokesman in Baghdad said a soldier died in a vehicle accident in Balad, but there were no further details. And the death toll rose to four following a bomb attack on US soldiers on Thursday on foot patrol in Khalidiya 80 kilometres west of Baghdad, the military said in a statement.   read more
 

Day 296: February 20, 2004

 

Iraqis in Najaf demand elections

Al Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/EC380581-0DA1-47B3-8C31-CA89BC5EFE10.htm 

UN electoral experts meet the Iraqi Governing Council

About 2,000 Iraqis took to the streets on Friday in the Shia holy city of Najaf to demand general elections, a day after UN chief Kofi Annan crushed hopes of an early vote.  "We call on the Iraqi people, those who are duty bound, to defend their right for legitimate elections," declared a statement by the rally organisers.   The protestors, who included doctors and engineers, gathered in front of Shia cleric Grand Ayat Allah Ali al-Sistani's office in Najaf, 160 km south of Baghdad, brandishing banners on which they had written "No, no to community divisions."  read more
 

Daily look at Iraq U.S. military deaths
Associated Press

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq%20US%20Deaths 
As of Friday, Feb. 20, 544 U.S. service members have died since the beginning of military operations in Iraq, according to the Department of Defense. Of those, 378 died as a result of hostile action and 166 died of non-hostile causes, the department said.  The non-hostile deaths count was reduced by one because of an accidental double count in yesterday's report the Defense Department said.  The British military has reported 58 deaths; Italy, 17; Spain, eight; Bulgaria, five; Thailand, two; Denmark, Ukraine and Poland have reported one each. 

read more
 

Day 295: February 19, 2004

 

Bremer: Iraqi power transfer date to hold

Robert H. Reid, Associated Press

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq%20Bremer 

Bremer at a Baghdad news conference Thursday

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- U.S. administrator L. Paul Bremer said Thursday that the formula for establishing a new Iraqi government could be changed but the date for the U.S.-led coalition to hand over power remains firm.  At the United Nations, Secretary-General Kofi Annan backed the U.S. position against holding elections before the June 30 transfer of power to Iraqis. He also said the June 30 date for the U.S.-led coalition to restore sovereignty to Iraq must be respected.  read more

 

Questions, answers about handling of Iraq
Robert H. Reid, Associated Press
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq%20Q%7EA 
Q: What is so hard about establishing an Iraqi government?
A: The United States wants to hand over sovereignty to a new Iraqi government on June 30. The problem is how to choose it. A U.S. plan from Nov. 15 would have the government appointed by a provisional legislature, which would be chosen in regional caucuses. The Shiite Muslim clergy and many Iraqis want the legislature to be chosen in direct elections. 

read more questions and answers
 

Day 294: February 18, 2004

 

Summary of Bomb attacks in Iraq since war began

Associated Press

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq%20Attacks%Glance 

Some of the deadly bombing attacks in Iraq since the war began March 20. President Bush declared major combat over May 1:

-Feb. 18: Two bomb-laden trucks blow up outside a Polish-run base in Hillah, killing at least 10 people, including the two drivers. Some 65 people are wounded, including Iraqis, Filipinos, Poles, Hungarians and an American.

-Feb. 11: A suicide attacker blows up a car packed with explosives in a crowd of Iraqis waiting outside an army recruiting center in Baghdad, killing 47 people.

-Feb. 10: A suicide bomber explodes a truckload of explosives outside a police station in Iskandariyah, 30 miles south of Baghdad, killing 53 people.  read more

 

11 Iraqis killed in failed suicide attack

Associated Press

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq%20Toll 

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- At least 11 Iraqi civilians were killed Wednesday morning when a pair of suicide bombers tried to attack a coalition base where international troops are based, a coalition spokeswoman said.  The attack outside Camp Charlie in Hillah left 58 coalition troops, including Hungarians, Poles and an American wounded, and injured another 44 Iraqis. Polish Gen. Mieczyslaw Bieniek called it a "well coordinated terrorist attack."  Spokeswoman Hilary White said the attack occurred near several homes located near the military camp and and the dead included men, women and children.  read more

 

Day 293: February 17, 2004

 

One child killed in Baghdad school bomb

Al Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/9C576F9F-BFDA-4ECA-AD4B-9C9AEDA8FD50.htm 

A grenade exploded in the school grounds

At least one child was killed and four others wounded in an explosion at a primary school in the Iraqi capital.  The US-led occupation's deputy operations chief, Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, told reporters on Monday the blast was a bomb attack.  "An IED (improvised explosive device) exploded at a school in central Baghdad in the Kadhimiyah district today at approximately 14:00 (11:00 GMT)," Kimmitt said.   "Initial reports indicate two civilians were killed and four were wounded," he said, adding that a disposal team sent to the scene found a second bomb, and it was defused.  read more
 

Iraq oil cash funded MPs' campaigns
Businessmen handed on money illicitly siphoned from UN deals to pressure groups run by George Galloway and Tam Dalyell
David Leigh and David Pallister, The Guardian
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/iraq/story/0,12956,1149796,00.html  
Money illicitly siphoned from the UN oil-for-food programme by Saddam Hussein was used to finance anti-sanctions campaigns run by British politicians, according to documents that have surfaced in Baghdad.
Undercover cash from oil deals went to three businessmen who in turn supported pressure groups involving the ex-Labour MP George Galloway, Labour MP Tam Dalyell, and the former Irish premier Albert Reynolds, it is alleged in documents compiled by the oil ministry, which is now under the control of the US occupation regime.  read more

 

Day 292: February 16, 2004

 

 

Over 150 Cities and Towns Join Global Vigil for Peace and End to the Occupation

Endthewar.org Feature

http://www.endthewar.org/features/feb152004.htm

On February 15th, 2004, thousands of people on different continents came out in public spaces to hold candles, sing songs, observe periods of silence and reflect upon the past year.  They came out to commemorate the dead from the war that began last march, and the first anniversary of the protests that sought to prevent the war in which tens of thousands have died.   Over 130 cities and towns across the United States, six cities in the United Kingdom, several cities in Canada and cities in Bangladesh, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, Switzerland and Sweden reported holding events as part of the "Global Vigil for Peace" called for by the National Grassroots Peace Network in the United States (GPN), (formerly the National Network to End the War Against Iraq). read more

 

 

SpaniSH rally against Iraq occupation
Al Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/52168B22-1308-4FB0-BABD-FE31AFBE6FC4.htm 

Estimates of demonstrator numbers vary widely

Thousands of demonstrators took to the streets of Madrid to demand an end to Iraq's occupation and the withdrawal of Spanish troops.  Organised by trade unions and social groups on Sunday, the protest comes a year after massive demonstrations in the capital and Barcelona against war.  Spanish PM Jose Maria Aznar, whose right-wing Popular Party is seeking re-election next month, was one of the staunchest supporters of the US-led invasion and occupation of Iraq.  Organisers said About 150,000 people took part in Sunday's march, but local officials put the figure at about 9000.  read more

 

Day 291: February 15, 2004

Bremer Admits Coalition Spending on Iraq Health Grossly Inadequate

Agence France Presse

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0215-03.htm 

Bremer: Admits Iraq's Health Care Still in Dire Need

BAGHDAD - The US overseer in Iraq was forced to admit that the coalition has failed to provide proper funding for the country's health system, after coming under a barrage of criticism here from top doctors.  Iraq's healthcare system, once among the best in the Middle East, has been brought to its knees by chronic underfunding by former leader Saddam Hussein and crippling UN sanctions imposed after his invasion of Kuwait in 1990.  US overseer Paul Bremer said the US-led coalition upped the health budget from 13 million dollars in 2002 to half a billion dollars in 2003, but it was not enough to pacify hundreds of doctors at a Baghdad medical conference.  "It's not nearly enough to cover the needs in the healthcare field," Bremer said, responding to those who branded Iraq's healthcare as "appalling" after more than a decade of international isolation.  The health ministry puts the infant mortality rate at 1.8 in 10, and that of mortality among children under the age of five at 1.31 in 10.  In the 11 months since the US-led invasion to remove Saddam, Iraq's health infrastructure has only recovered to its pre-war level.  Although the country's 240 public hospitals and 95 percent of the country's private clinics reopened last year, there are still enormous shortages of nurses, equipment, drugs and beds across the country.  Washington has spent hundreds of million of dollars on medical equipment and increased pharmaceuticals from 300 tonnes to more than 12,000 tonnes since the war, Bremer said.  When pressed repeatedly about drug shortages, Bremer insisted that only applied to "isolated cases".  Washington has allocated three-quarters of a billion dollars for Iraqi healthcare from a supplemental budget approved by Congress, but Bremer looked to a donors' meeting in Abu Dhabi next month to raise more cash from elsewhere.  At a similiar conference in October, 73 nations pledged 33 billion dollars in reconstruction money for the war-torn country.  Bremer said that Iraqi oil exports would generate four to five billion dollars in excess of government expenses, which would be distributed by the first post-occupation administration for 2005.   "This will be a difficult year ... by next year Iraq should be back in surplus," he told hundreds of doctors who gathered for the conference.  --END STORY--

 

Gunmen in Iraq open fire on U.S. convoy
Associated Press

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq%20Attack 

An armed Iraqi men takes cover on the streets of Fallujah

Insurgents stormed an Iraqi security compound and a government building on Saturday in an attack that left 20 people dead, hospital officials said.  Gunmen opened fire Sunday on a U.S. convoy on a Baghdad highway, setting one vehicle ablaze, and witnesses said three foreigners were wounded.  read more
 

23 killed as Iraqi rebels overrun police station
Patrick Graham, The Observer

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1148650,00.html 
Ask Hussein Saleh what happened yesterday morning and he hoarsely describes standing outside his police station when it was overrun by attackers who were firing rocket-propelled grenades and machine guns. Ask him about the US army and he turns his head and screams: 'Shit on the Americans, shit on them.'  The 23-year-old Iraqi policeman was shot in the leg, fracturing the bone, in one of the largest and best-organised attacks of its kind since the end of the war last April. The three other policemen standing beside him were shot dead, he says, when dozens of attackers overran Falluja's main police station and laid siege to a heavily guarded fort of the Iraqi Civil Defence Corps (ICDC) nearby. The bold daylight assault on an Iraqi police station and a security compound met with little resistance as guerrillas shouting 'God is great' gunned down policemen and freed dozens of prisoners in a battle that killed 23 people. Most of the dead were policemen.  read more
 

Day 290: February 14, 2004

 

AUTHORS TAKE SIDES ON IRAQ WAR
The Guardian

http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,12084,1147406,00.html  
In 1937 WH Auden and Stephen Spender asked 150 writers for their views on the Spanish Civil War. The result was the book Authors Take Sides. Jean Moorcroft Wilson and Cecil Woolf have repeated the exercise, asking literary figures if they were for or against the Iraq war and whether they thought it would bring lasting peace and stability.  read more
 

American plan for Iraq needs complete overhaul, Un envoy warns
Too little time left for credible elections, compounded by 'very serious danger' of civil war
Rory McCarthy, The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1148065,00.html 
The UN threw America's latest political plan for Iraq into disarray yesterday by making it clear that direct elections cannot be held before the June 30 transfer of power to an Iraqi authority.
This was a key demand of the Shias, whose leaders set their face against the US plan to give control of the country to panels of "the great and the good". Last night the UN envoy, Lakhdar Brahimi, said power should still be handed over to the Iraqis this summer as planned. But his aides said there would not be time to hold "credible elections" before then. read more
 

Day 289: February 13, 2004

Iraq images top photo contest

Al Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/E90ECD50-4527-4B20-A348-A03761AA9562.htm 

Prize winning entry - choosen from among 63,000 entries

A picture of a hooded Iraqi prisoner of war hugging his small, frightened son behind a barbed wire fence won the prestigious World Press Photo of the year 2003.  French photographer Jean-Marc Bouju's picture topped a record 63,093 entries submitted to the 47th annual contest by 4176 photographers from 124 countries. In the winning image, jagged wire partly obscures the view of the barefoot boy being comforted by his father, both seated on the sandy ground of a POW camp near Najaf in Iraq.   The man, dressed in white, was made to wear a black plastic hood by the US troops who detained him. read more
 

US soldier killed in Baghdad blast
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/791DFD43-1255-4C3D-A84A-A55D0138D9FE.htm 

The soldier is the 258th American to be killed in Iraq since 1 May
A US soldier was killed by a bomb blast in Baghdad as a United Nations team continued to assess demands for early elections.  The latest violence came as the US military said Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who has a $10 million price on his head, is the prime suspect in deadly bombings that hit Najaf and the UN headquarters in Baghdad last year.  The soldier, from the 16th military police brigade, was killed and two were wounded when a device struck an army patrol near the Abu Gharib district of Baghdad at around 10:40 pm on Thursday, the military said.   read more

 

Day 289: February 13, 2004

 

Grenade attack on US general as UN consults Iraqis on elections
Rory McCarthy, The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1147090,00.html 

Gen. Abizaid escaped unharmed

America's most senior general in the Middle East came under attack yesterday when insurgents armed with guns and rocket-propelled grenades fired at his convoy as it arrived at an Iraqi Civil Defence Corps building. The assault on General John Abizaid's party in the troubled town of Falluja lasted for six minutes, as US soldiers returned fire with rifles and machine guns. Gen Abizaid was unhurt in the incident. But it raised concern about whether the attack was a random assault on the Iraqi base, a common occurrence in Falluja, or a deliberate attempt to kill him - which would suggest a serious breach in military security.  read more
 

 

How Saddam got US intentions all wrong
New York TImes
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/02/12/1076548165034.html 
Saddam Hussein was so convinced war would be averted or the US would mount only a limited bombing campaign that he deployed the Iraqi military to crush domestic uprisings rather than defend against a ground invasion, captured Iraqi leaders and former officers say.  A complacent Saddam believed a "casualty-averse" White House would order a bombing campaign that Iraq could withstand, according to a classified log of interrogations with captured Iraqi leaders and former officers.  And the Iraqi defence ministry, in a grand miscalculation, believed any ground offensive would come across the border with Jordan. The report was prepared for Pentagon leaders and dated January 26. A rough-draft history of the war from the perspective of Iraqi leaders, it offers a scathing history of a Stalinist, paranoid leadership circle in Baghdad that guaranteed its own destruction. read more

 

Halliburton faces more accusations of overbilling
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/DA652664-75A8-4DA5-8427-D51AB7318D4A.htm 

Controversial US oil giant Halliburton is facing new accusations with two ex-employees alleging the firm "routinely overcharged" for work it did for the US military.  Examples of wasteful spending given by the former employees ranged from leasing ordinary vehicles for $7000 a month to seeking embroidered towels at a cost of $7.50 each when ordinary ones would have cost about a third of the price. The Texas company, which is already being examined by the military for possible overcharging for services, has consistently denied allegations of overbilling.  The two ex-employees, who contacted US Representative Henry Waxman, a Californian Democrat who has been critical of Halliburton, worked for the firm's procurement office in Kuwait.  read more
 

Day 288: February 12, 2004

 

US opens up Iraq contract bids
Iraq's battered infrastructure is in dire need of repair
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/021BAAFF-95AE-4F8E-A354-91B15B87FC79.htm 

Iraq's battered infrastructure is in dire need of repair

The United States has declared companies from all countries eligible to bid for $6 billion worth of contracts in Iraq.  The move confirms the Bush administration's change of heart over restrictions that excluded countries opposed to last year's invasion of the country.  The move was announced on Wednesday in a notice posted by Iraq's US-appointed Coalition Provisional Authority on a website devoted to Iraq procurement programmes.  read more
 

 

Fearful Iraqis Weigh Working With U.S.
Bombings at Recruting Sites Could Hamper Security Handover
Ariana Eunjung Cha, Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A31320-2004Feb11.html 
BAGHDAD, Feb. 11 -- After two bombings in less than 24 hours killed at least 100 people at recruiting sites for the country's new security forces, many Iraqis are questioning the wisdom and safety of seeking work with institutions that support the U.S.-led occupation. A vehicle bomb in Baghdad on Wednesday morning killed 47 people, many of whom were waiting outside a government building to apply for jobs in the new U.S.-trained Iraqi army. Lines at the main gate of the army recruiting center began forming before dawn, witnesses said, and hundreds of applicants had gathered by 7 a.m.  read more

 

Day 287: February 11, 2004

 

US Military to Run Out of Money for Iraq, Afghanistan by September
Drew Brown, Knight-Ritter
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0211-07.htm 
WASHINGTON - The U.S. military will run out of money for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan at the end of September unless President Bush asks for additional funds, top military officials acknowledged Tuesday.  Because the Bush administration's $401.7 billion fiscal 2005 defense budget contains no money for Iraq and Afghanistan, the armed services will be forced to pay for operations in the two countries with money that's supposed to be used for modernization and other items. "I am concerned ... how we bridge the gap between the end of this fiscal year and whenever we could get a supplemental (spending bill) in the next year," Army Chief of Staff Gen. Peter Schoomaker told the Senate Armed Services Committee. "And I don't have an answer for exactly how we would do that."  read more

 

Over 40 Iraqis killed in Baghdad blast

Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/698F8349-6215-40A1-9125-F0AEF8A0EC88.htm 

Troops inspect mangled wreckage of the exploded vehicle

A car bomb has exploded at an Iraqi army recruitment centre in central Baghdad, killing more than 40 recruits, in the second deadly attack against Iraqis working with US occupation forces in 24 hours. "Forty-seven people were killed and more than 50 injured," General Ahmad Kathim, the Iraqi Interior Ministry undersecretary told Aljazeera's correspondent. He said the driver of an explosive-laden car headed towards a military training centre and detonated the bomb among a group of volunteers for the new Iraqi army. read more
 

Military police investigate Iraqi PoW's death
Adam Blenford, the Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1145761,00.html 
A British soldier is under military investigation amid allegations that he severely beat an Iraqi prisoner of war who later died in custody from serious injuries.  The investigation, which has been under way since the alleged incident happened last year, could lead to a manslaughter charge and military court martial for the soldier.  Six Iraqis lodged complaints with the Royal Military police after a company from the Queen's Lancashire Regiment arrested them and three others in the British-controlled city of Basra, according to reports in the Sun.  Troops allegedly kept the Iraqis hooded.  read more

 

Day 286: February 10, 2004

 

Dozens Killed in Bombing South of Baghdad
Mariam Fam, Associated Press

http://truthout.org/docs_04/021104C.shtml 

ISKANDARIYAH, Iraq - A suicide bomber blew up a truckload of explosives Tuesday outside a police station south of Baghdad, killing up to 53 people and wounding scores — including would-be Iraqi recruits lined up to apply for jobs. The explosion reduced parts of the station to rubble and damaged nearby buildings. The street in front of the station was littered with the wreckage of shattered vehicles as well as pieces of glass, bricks, mangled steel and pieces of clothing. "It was the day for applying for new recruits," said policeman Wissam Abdul-Karim, who was thrown to the ground by the blast. "There were dozens of them waiting outside the police station." It was at least the eighth vehicle bombing in Iraq this year and followed warnings from occupation officials that insurgents would step up attacks against Iraqis who work with the U.S.-led coalition, especially ahead of the planned June 30 transfer of sovereignty to a provisional Iraqi government. read more

 

Japan's Military Sculpts Image in Iraqi Sand

Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A26984-2004Feb9.html 

Japanese troops inspect their Samawah base Monday. Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi says the deployment will help normalize Japan.

Japan is in the midst of a historic deployment of roughly 1,000 troops to Iraq, which has jarred the country's psyche. No Japanese soldier has fallen -- or killed an enemy -- since the surrender to the United States in 1945.  Fresh-faced soldiers in crisp camouflage and new black boots eagerly bounded onto towering blocks of hard snow. Armed with shovels and sculpting tools, they were deploying on one of the trademark missions for Japanese troops -- carving statues for the annual Sapporo Snow Festival.  read more
 

US occupation soldiers killed in Iraq

Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/0F092A8F-D89E-49C6-832C-4DEEF9CD3932.htm 
Two US soldiers have been killed and six wounded in an accidental explosion in northern Iraq.  The blast occurred at Sinjar, 120kms west of the main northern city of Mosul, while the troops were involved in explosive ordnance disposal (EOD), a US military spokesman said on Monday. "There were two US soldiers killed and two wounded in northern Iraq in the Sinjar area while conducting EOD operations."  The latest US military deaths take to more than 530 the number of American soldiers killed in combat, by accident or suicide since the US-led invasion of Iraq last March.  read more
 

Day 285: February 9, 2004

 

BLIX: BUSH AND BLAIR ARE PEDDLARS OF WAR
James Lyons and Sam Sheringham, PA News
http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2508594
Prime Minister Tony Blair and US President George W Bush were under increased pressure over the Iraq war today after the UN’s former chief weapons inspector compared their behaviour in the run-up to the war to salesmen trying to shift a product. Hans Blix accused the two leaders of exaggerating intelligence on Saddam Hussein’s arsenal.  The Prime Minister’s claim that Iraq could launch a chemical attack in 45 minutes was made to “dramatise” their case, Dr Blix said.  read more

 

US troops attacked by gunmen
IOL (South Africa)

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=123&art_id=qw1076284980901B262&set_id=1 

Tikrit - Gunmen, including a major in the new Iraqi police force - which is being trained by the United States - attacked a group of American soldiers, sparking a gunbattle in which the officer was killed and two other attackers wounded.  The soldiers were observing a house belonging to a person suspected in rocket-propelled grenade attacks on American forces in the village of Qadisiyah, 50km south of Tikrit, when the gunmen opened fire on Saturday evening, the military said in a statement.  read more
 

 

Nato happy to ignore explosion in Afghan opium output, says Russia

Richard Norton-Taylor and agencies, The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/afghanistan/story/0,1284,1143881,00.html  

Nato is turning a blind eye to the flourishing opium trade in Afghanistan to ensure the support of warlords in the struggle to maintain security in the country, Russia's defence minister has claimed. Sergei Ivanov said Afghanistan was now producing nine times the quantity of drugs it did under the Taliban.  "It is understandable that by allowing drug peddling in Afghanistan, the [Nato] alliance ensures loyalty of warlords on the ground and of some Afghan leaders," he said.  read more

 

 

U.N. team, Iraqis discuss propect of early elections

American soldier killed in roadside bombing near Baghdad

MSNBC

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4016883/  

The U.N. envoy to Iraq, Lakhdar Brahimi, center

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A U.N. team met with Iraqi leaders Sunday to discuss the feasibility of early legislative elections, and its leader pledged to do “everything possible” to help the country regain its sovereignty.  Meanwhile, the U.S. military said an American soldier was killed on Sunday afternoon by a bomb on a road south of Baghdad.  Earlier, a bomb planted inside a police station killed three Iraqi policemen and injured 11 others on Saturday, officials said. 

read more

 

Day 284: February 8, 2004

 

Rumsfeld orders sex attack inquiry
The Sun-Herald
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/02/07/1075854119153.html 

Rumsfeld: "Commanders must protect victims"

US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has ordered an urgent investigation into Pentagon safeguards after a spate of reports of male troops sexually abusing female comrades in Iraq and Kuwait. "Sexual assault will not be tolerated. Commanders at every level have a duty to protect victims," Mr Rumsfeld said in a memo revealing that there had been 88 reports of sexual misconduct, which covers rape, attempted rape, indecent assault and sodomy in the Central Command that includes Iraq. and Kuwait as well as the Horn of Africa, the entire Gulf region and Central Asia including Afghanistan.  Eighty involved army soldiers, with seven from the air force and one from the marines.  

read more

 

Britain spied on UN allies over war vote
Security Council members 'illegally targeted' by GCHQ after plea from US security agency
The Observer
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1143572,00.html 
Britain helped America to conduct a secret and potentially illegal spying operation at the United Nations in the run-up to the Iraq war, The Observer can reveal.   The operation, which targeted at least one permanent member of the UN Security Council, was almost certainly in breach of the Vienna conventions on diplomatic relations, which strictly outlaw espionage at the UN missions in New York.  Translators and analysts at the Government's top-secret surveillance centre GCHQ were ordered to co-operate with an American espionage 'surge' on Security Council delegations after a request from the US National Security Agency at the end of January 2003. This was designed to help smooth the way for a second UN resolution authorising war in Iraq.  read more
 

Day 283: February 7, 2004

 

Now it's a battle for the truth
Marion Wilkinson, Sydney Morning Herald

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/02/06/1075854070686.html 

Liars or dupes?  Blair, Howard and Bush

It is unnerving to watch the world's most powerful intelligence chief with his back to the wall. But when the CIA's director, George Tenet, stood up at Georgetown University to explain his handling of the prewar intelligence on Iraq's weapons, there was little doubt he was on the defensive and his career was on the line.  "I have come here today to talk to you, and to the American people, about something important to our nation and central to our future," he told the packed auditorium. "I want to tell you about our information and how we reached our judgements."  Underscoring his anxiety, the spy chief promised, "I will tell you what I think - honestly and directly."  Tenet set about strenuously defending many of the flawed claims in the prewar US National Intelligence Estimate of Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction. The claims in that document, released in October 2002, were repeatedly exploited by President George Bush, Australia's Prime Minister, John Howard, and Britain's Tony Blair before the Iraq war.  read more
 

Two killed in Iraq checkpoint attack
Al Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/45873A3C-9811-409D-8D6C-FEA410110501.htm 
Two Iraqi men have been killed and two teenagers have been wounded after US soldiers returned fire after an attack on a checkpoint in the northern town of Samarra, witnesses and medics said. An owner of a shop near the checkpoint, Safaa Abud Abbas, said a rocket-propelled grenade was fired at the US checkpoint by two people in a car, but missed the soldiers. The Americans retaliated by returning fire. Medical sources at Samarra hospital told AFP two men, aged 25 and 62 had been shot dead, and that two teenagers, aged 13 and 14, were wounded. A US military spokesman could not immediately confirm the deaths, but said they were being investigated. read more

 

Day 282: February 6, 2004

 

Sistani escapes assassination attempt
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/86848575-ED24-4711-AF8A-F6425235633B.htm

Al-Sistani has survived previous assassination attempts

Iraq's Shia leader Grand Ayat Allah Ali al-Sistani has escaped an assassination attempt in the city of Najaf.  A member of the US-appointed occupation administration confirmed the cleric was still in the Shia pilgrimage city on Thursday awaiting a UN mission that will review his political demands. His spokesman and Governing Council member, Muwaffaq al-Rubai, confirmed Wednesday's assassination attempt but said little else other than that al-Sistani is "safe and sound". read more
 

Baghdad museum too afraid to reopen
Jennie Matthew, Middle East Online

http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/?id=8773 
Nearly a year later, experts at Iraq's National Museum still remember the horror when looters plundered thousands of treasures as they struggle to rebuild a world class collection.  Mercilessly ransacked when Saddam Hussein's regime crumbled in April, the museum remains shut, its vast exhibition rooms barren, glass cabinets smashed, antiquities defaced and the floor thick with dust.  In a building surrounded by coils of barbed wire, guarded by dozens of Facility Protection Service officers and patrolled daily by US troops, director Donny George says he is too frightened to reopen his doors to the public.  read more
 

Day 281: February 5, 2004

 

Depleted Uranium is one of the suspected causes of GWS

Gulf war syndrome: the legal case collapses
Clare Dyer, The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/military/story/0,11816,1141360,00.html 
An eight-year, multimillion pound legal battle by more than 2,000 veterans for compensation for Gulf war syndrome has collapsed because there is not enough scientific evidence to prove their case in court.  The Legal Services Commission (LSC), which is estimated to have spent around £4m on the case, is expected to withdraw legal aid this month after being told by the veterans' lawyers that the action has no real chance of success. Taking the case to trial in the high court could cost a further £4m in legal aid.  read more

 

US may delay Iraq power handover deadline
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/039B5067-4421-4C18-AD83-71A57B757106.htm 
The United States has hinted it might put off the planned deadline for transferring power in Iraq if the United Nations recommends a delay.  Officials on Wednesday said Washington had every intention of adhering to the 30 June handover agreed by the US-led occupation and the Iraqi interim leadership but added there was "room" for the date to be put off if the UN desired.  "The intention is not to come up with something post-30 June, but we have to leave a little room for the UN to come up with what they think best," a senior State Department official said.  read more
 

Day 280: February 4, 2004

 

First award for depleted uranium poisoning claim
Martin Williams, The Herald

http://www.theherald.co.uk/news/9272.html 
A Scots ex-soldier has become the first veteran to win a pension appeal after being diagnosed with depleted uranium (DU) poisoning during the 1991 Gulf war.  A Pension Appeal Tribunal Service hearing in Edinburgh accepted medical evidence provided by Kenny Duncan, of Clackmannan, previously dismissed by the MoD, which revealed he had become ill after service in the Middle East.  read more

 

PowelL rows back on doubts over invasion
'Absence of stockpile changes the political calculus'
Suzanne Goldenberg, The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1140426,00.html 

Powell: Having Doubts

The US secretary of state, Colin Powell, yesterday revealed the first cracks of doubt from within the Bush administration about the decision to go to war against Iraq, acknowledging he might not have supported an invasion had he known Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction. Mr Powell's admission that the "absence of a stockpile changes the political calculus" was the first public sign that the Bush administration may be having second thoughts on its decision to wage war. read more

 

US war machine nearly fell apart, army reveals
New York Times

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/02/03/1075776064461.html 
The first official army history of the Iraq war reveals that United States forces were plagued by supply shortages, radios that could not reach far-flung troops and virtually no reliable intelligence on how Saddam Hussein would defend Baghdad.   While it is well known that many army units ran low on fuel and water as fast-moving armoured forces raced towards the Iraqi capital, the study offers vivid new details of a supply system nearing collapse. Tank engines sat on warehouse shelves in Kuwait with no truck drivers to carry them north. Broken-down trucks were scavenged for usable parts and left by the roadside. Artillery units cannibalised parts from captured Iraqi guns to keep their howitzers operating. In most cases, soldiers improvised solutions to keep the offensive rolling. "The morass of problems that confounded delivering parts and supplies - running the gamut of paper clips to tank engines - stems from the lack of a means to assign responsibility clearly," the report concluded. read more
 

Day 279: February 3, 2004

 

US Iraq probe has allies squirming

President Bush had dodged calls for an independent investigation
Al Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/1368594C-D3AF-43D5-850E-626BA31AC505.htm 

President Bush had dodged calls for an independent investigation

President George Bush says he will set up an inquiry into intelligence mistakes over Iraq's alleged weapons programme, putting pressure on Washington's closest allies to follow suit.  Bush said on Monday he will appoint an independent commission to investigate discrepancies in intelligence used to justify the war against Iraq.   "I want to know all the facts," he told reporters. He also said he would meet soon with David Kay, the former chief US weapons hunter in Iraq, who told a congressional hearing last
week that much of the intelligence about Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction was wrong. read more

 

Iraq's missing weapons: an inquiry is forced upon Blair
Nicholas Watt, Richard Norton-Taylor and Suzanne Goldenberg, The Guardian

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/iraq/story/0,12956,1137611,00.html
Tony Blair will today embark on a major u-turn when he bows to intense pressure and agrees to set up an inquiry to establish why Iraq appears to be devoid of weapons of mass destruction. To the delight of anti-war MPs, who were told by the prime minister last year that they would have to "eat their words" when banned weapons were uncovered, Mr Blair will announce that a cross-party committee of privy counsellors will examine whether there were intelligence failings. In a sign of ministerial nerves, Downing Street has turned to the ultimate Whitehall insider to take charge of the inquiry.   read more

 

Day 278: February 2, 2004

56 Dead as Blasts Target Iraq's Kurdish Parties
Local Leaders Among at Least 56 Killed in Suicide Attacks at Political Offices
Daniel Williams, Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A2864-2004Feb1.html 
In nearly simultaneous strikes Sunday, a pair of suicide bombers set off explosives during Muslim holiday celebrations inside two buildings housing offices of the main Kurdish parties in northern Iraq, killing at least 56 people and wounding more than 200. The blasts killed senior members of the two parties, the Kurdistan Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, which are among the best-organized and most staunch U.S. allies in Iraq. Both groups supported the invasion that toppled President Saddam Hussein and put their large militias at the service of U.S. commanders. read more

Iraqi court to try Saddam
Al Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/130B8C35-9CDD-40A6-AB28-B2B546C28A2D.htm 
Governing Council is setting up a court to try the ousted leader.  Ousted President Saddam Hussein remains in Iraq and will be handed over to a special court being set up by the US-appointed Governing Council. The former Iraqi leader will face charges of genocide and invasion of neighbouring countries, US occupation chief Paul Bremer said in an interview published on Saturday.  "Saddam is in Iraq now, and yes he will be tried publicly by a special Iraqi court when the prerequisites for setting up such a court are completed," Bremer told the Arabic-language daily al-Sharq al-Awsat. read more
 

Iraqis set to take over Baghdad security

Vijay Josh, Associated Press

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq%20Baghdad%20Security 

U.S. troops are ready to hand over security patrols in Baghdad to Iraqi forces, a U.S. commander said Monday, adding that his soldiers had made significant inroads against insurgent networks in the capital.  American soldiers will gradually move to the edge of the city as more Iraqi Civil Defense Forces and police graduate from U.S.-supervised training, said Brig. Gen. Martin Dempsey, commander of the 1st Armored Division, which is in charge of Baghdad.  "It is a necessary and correct step," he said.  Dempsey's announcement comes two weeks after a suicide bomber blew up his vehicle at a gate of the U.S.-led coalition's headquarters, killing at least 31 people and wounding more than 120. Still, Dempsey said the number of insurgent attacks have gone down with the arrest of 118 people during the last three weeks. read more

Attackers fire grenade at army vehicle
Associated Press

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Wolfowitz%20Attack 
Attackers fired a rocket propelled grenade at an army vehicle Monday as Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz met with local officials across town.  No one was hurt and the Stryker infantry carrier vehicle was only slightly damaged, said Brig. Gen. Carter Ham. Attackers in a passing car fired the RPG at the vehicle but its protective armor deflected the blast, Ham said.  Ham, the incoming commander of army forces in northern Iraq, said a Kiowa helicopter tried to locate the attackers' car but failed.  read more
 

Iraq plea for urgent injection of aid
Reuters
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/99C171C3-F716-4348-8427-98304EF63B27.htm 
International aid pledged to rebuild Iraq three months ago must be injected immediately without waiting for security to improve.  Planning minister Mahdi al-Hafidh told journalists in Baghdad on Monday a meeting would convene in the United Arab Emirates at the end of February to activate two funds run by the World Bank and the United Nations. The accounts are to manage around $15 billion of non-US aid pledged to Iraq. "It is vital for these commitments to be realised as soon as possible. The need is urgent. Iraq is in a state of destruction," the minister said. read more
 

Day 277: February 1, 2004

 

Pre-Eid blast kills five in Baghdad
Al Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/87E3C94D-E137-49F5-8D76-0CCB6E331660.htm 
A hotel in al-Karrada was attacked earlier in the week.  At least five Palestinians have been killed and seven others wounded in a mortar explosion in a northern district of Baghdad.  A spokesman for the Palestinians living in the Baladiyyat neighbourhood in the Iraqi capital said the shell exploded in an apartment at 7:30pm (16:30 GMT).  Some 1332 Palestinian families live in the capital's Baladiyyat district, he added.  The US military earlier confirmed that a series of explosions rang out across Baghdad, without providing any further details.   read more

 

Ellsberg admires Briton as fellow whistle-blower
The famed U.S. spiller of secrets from the Vietnam era says the woman who released an NSA communique before the Iraq war did the right thing
Sun Journal
http://www.sunspot.net/news/printedition/bal-te.journal01feb01,0,7828987.column?coll=bal-pe-asection 
It is a different time, a different war and a different country. But America's most famous leaker, Daniel Ellsberg, senses a kindred spirit in a 29-year-old British intelligence officer now facing criminal charges for leaking a top-secret National Security Agency document a year ago in a failed attempt to derail the looming war on Iraq. Last week, shortly after Katharine Gun pleaded not guilty to violating Britain's Official Secrets Act, Ellsberg and other anti-war Americans launched a public campaign defending her actions. In interviews and an article for the British newspaper The Guardian, the 72-year-old activist spoke out in defense of Gun, a Chinese-language translator and analyst at Government Communications Headquarters until her arrest in March. GCHQ, in the small English city of Cheltenham, intercepts phone calls, faxes, e-mail and the like and collaborates with the NSA, the mammoth eavesdropping agency at Fort Meade.  "I really admire and appreciate what Katharine Gun's done," Ellsberg told The Sun from his Berkeley, Calif., home. "I was in the same position as she was, being on trial for doing the right thing."  read more

 

Blair Under Pressure for Iraq Intelligence Inquiry
Reuters

http://truthout.org/docs_04/020304B.shtml 

Most Britons want an independent inquiry into intelligence cited by Prime Minister Tony Blair to justify joining the U.S.-led war on Iraq last year, new polls showed Sunday.  The polls mirror pressure in the United States for President Bush to launch a similar inquiry after a former chief weapons inspector said he did not believe Iraq had stockpiles of illicit weapons and intelligence indicating otherwise was wrong.  Polls in The Mail Sunday and the Sunday Times showed 61 percent and 54 percent respectively wanted an investigation into London's much-criticized evidence of Saddam Hussein's alleged weapons of mass destruction.  The figures give added momentum to calls from British opposition politicians and anti-war protesters for an inquiry.

  "There will be a mounting clamor, particularly given events in Washington over the past few days...that we really need a searching examination into the entire basis on which this government took us into that war," Charles Kennedy, leader of Britain's Liberal Democrats, told Sky television.  read more

 

JANUARY 2004

 

Day 276: January 31, 2004

 

Pentagon's Wolfowitz defends war in Iraq
Matt Kelley, Associated Press

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Wolfowitz%20Army 

WUERZBURG, Germany -- The United States was justified in going to war against Iraq because Saddam Hussein violated U.N. resolutions ordering him to disarm, the Pentagon's second-in-command said Saturday.  Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz said flawed intelligence about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction should be investigated, but the inability of inspectors to find such weapons did not mean the war was unnecessary.  David Kay, the former chief inspector in Iraq, said this week he believes deposed Iraqi President Saddam probably did not have the stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons that President Bush claimed as justification for the invasion in March. read more

 

Iraq roadside blast kills 3 U.S. troops

Associated Press

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq%20Americans%20Killed 

TIKRIT, Iraq -- A homemade bomb planted on a road exploded Saturday as a U.S. Army convoy passed by, killing three soldiers, the U.S. military said.  A military spokesman said an improvised bomb blew up about 25 miles southwest of Kirkuk, near a convoy of the 4th Infantry Division. The spokesman said he had no other details.

Kirkuk, a major oil producing area, is about 60 miles north of Tikrit where the 4th Infantry Division is based. --end story--

 

Iraq car bomb blast kills 9, injures 45

Vijay Joshi, Associated Press

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq%20Explosion 

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- A car bomb exploded Saturday outside a police station in Iraq's third largest city, killing at least nine people and wounding 45, witnesses and hospital staff said.  Witnesses in Mosul saw severed limbs and decapitated bodies on the street in front of the police station. Windows of buildings were shattered and plumes of smoke could be seen in the area.  Staff at the Republican Hospital in Mosul said nine people including civilians and policemen were killed and 45 others were injured.  read more

 

Day 275: January 30, 2004

 

Syria ready to return Iraqi money
Asad does not want to give the money to the Americans 

AFP
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/E452D4E6-DF9C-4971-917C-B8A19C21B8F9.htm 
Syrian President Bashar al-Asad is ready to return to Iraqi authorities money stashed in Syria by ousted president Saddam Hussein but does not want to give it to the Americans in Baghdad.  "President Asad gave an assurance that Iraqi cash deposited in Syria is secure and that he is ready to return it to the Iraqi authorities," Mowaffaq al-Rubaie, a member of Iraq's transitional Governing Council, told a news conference on Thursday after talks with the Syrian leader and Vice-President Abd al-Halim Khaddam.  "Asad stated that he wanted to hand over the money to the Iraqi authorities and not to the (American) occupation forces," said Rubaie, who arrived in Damascus on Wednesday night. read more
 

U.N. Poised To Reenter Iraq
CBS News

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/01/27/iraq/main596113.shtml 
The United Nations pulled out of Iraq after its headquarters was attacked by a suicide bomber in August. Twenty-two people died, including Annan's special representative Sergio Vieira de Mello. "If no agreement can be reached on that mechanism and the formula for the provisional government then I'm very much worried that there will be continuance of division and conflict."  U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan says the key to Iraq's future is consensus among the nation's various groups. "I think we are making progress," Annan told reporters in Belgium. "The coalition has indicated to me, has promised us, it will do its utmost to protect the team that will work in Iraq. Therefore, in the next few days, the team should be able to travel to start work."   read more

 

Day 274: January 29, 2004

 

Blast hits Iraqi security forces north of Baghdad
At least five civilians wounded in Baquoba, police say

MSNBC

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4016883/ 

A roadside bomb exploded Thursday in a central Iraqi city in the volatile Sunni Triangle, wounding five people, police said.  The bomb was placed on a road near a sports stadium in Baqouba and exploded during the morning rush hour, Iraqi police Capt. Mohammed Saleh said.  He said five Iraqi civilians were wounded. No other details were available.  read more

 

Iraqi Communists Make a Comeback

Public Wake for Bomb Victim Reflects New Status of Long-Persecuted Party
Pamela Constable, Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A58107-2004Jan28.html 
The funeral canopy stretched nearly a full block in front of Yasser Aboud's house in a rundown Shiite Muslim district of the capital. All day a stream of mourners came and went: men in Arab robes and business suits and greasy work pants, greeting one another soberly and sitting awhile under the tent to sip tea, smoke cigarettes and gossip quietly. But even in grief, Monday's gathering was a political celebration of sorts. Two men were dead, victims of a terrorist bombing Jan. 22 at a neighborhood office of the Iraqi Communist Party. But for the first time after decades of furtive, underground life, party members could mourn their dead proudly, in public and by name.  read more

 

Day 273: January 28, 2004

 

Baghdad hotel car bomb kills 4, wounds 17

Sarah El Deeb, Associated Press
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq Explosion 

A car bomb exploded in front of a hotel used by Westerners in central Baghdad on Wednesday, partially destroying the three-story building and killing at least four people, officials said. A receptionist at the hotel said one of the dead was South African.  Three burned out cars were seen in front of the Shaheen hotel, only their metal skeletons remaining. Another half burned car lay a short distance away, on Masbah street in the upscale Karadah district. read more

 

 

Baghdad hit by another car bomb

Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/4D3EECAE-1841-405A-905F-B7A8ECA1FA13.htm

The Iraqi capital is regularly being rocked by blasts

At least three people have been killed in a powerful car bomb explosion that ripped through the centre of Baghdad early on Wednesday.Locals said the blast destroyed a police post and tore the front of a hotel in the Iraqi capital's upmarket Karrada district, setting fire to cars nearby. "There are at least three dead," a local police official said.  The police said an ambulance packed with explosives drove up to the Shahine hotel at high speed and detonated.  "According to testimonies we received, an ambulance arrived very quickly in front of the hotel," Lieutenant Husayn Ali, the chief of police patrols in Karrada said.  read more

 

US dilutes anti-genocide declaration
Al Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/85FB2730-704E-4501-B593-0EF736A7BB54.htm 
US opposition to the International Criminal Court (ICC) is likely to weaken a final international declaration against genocide.  Delegates at the "Preventing Genocide" conference in Stockholm this Wednesday were expected to issue the most powerful document ever condemning mass killing.  But US opposition to recognising ICC authority - widely considered the most promising new tools in the fight against genocide - will make any declaration less effective, according to delegates.  read more

 

Day 272: January 27, 2004

 

Three U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq attack

Associated Press

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq%20Soldiers%20Killed

Three U.S. troops killed and three others wounded late Tuesday when a roadside bomb exploded south of Baghdad, the U.S. military said.  The attack occurred about 8 p.m. near Iskandariyah, about 27 miles south of the Iraqi capital, a statement said.  Earlier Tuesday, three other U.S. soldiers were killed in a bombing near Khaldiyah west of Baghdad.

 

A look at Tuesday's developments in Iraq

Associated Press

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq%20Developments

A look at Tuesday's major developments in Iraq:

- Separate roadside bombings killed six Americans - three west of Baghdad and three south of the capital - and wounded four. Two Iraqis also died.

- U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in Paris he was ready to send a team to Iraq to assess prospects for early elections once the U.S.-led coalition can guarantee security.

- President Bush defended his decision to go to war despite chief inspector David Kay's conclusion that Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction, as the United States had believed. Bush said he had "great confidence" in the intelligence community, which had provided prewar estimates about Saddam's arsenal. But Bush refrained from saying weapons of mass destruction would be discovered eventually. Bush had cited Saddam's alleged weapons as justification for the war.  read more

 

Day 271: January 26, 2004

 

Rocket lands in U.S. Iraq compound

Vijay Joshi, Associated Press

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq%20Blasts 

A rocket landed Monday night near coalition headquarters in the U.S.-controlled area of Baghdad known as the "green zone" but caused no injuries or damage, the U.S. military said.

The rocket fell in an open parking lot near the Republican Palace used by top U.S. officials in Iraq, a coalition official said on condition of anonymity. The U.S. command said there were no casualties or damage to equipment.  That explosion was preceded by the sounds of two smaller blasts, but their origin was unclear.  After the blasts, sirens went off in the green zone and a recorded message broadcast over loud speakers urged people to "take cover." 

read more

 

Marines charged in Iraqi prisoner death
Seth Hettena, AP

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apus_story.asp?category=1110&slug=US%20Iraq%20Prisoner%20Death
CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. -- Three Marine reservists appeared in military court Monday to face charges stemming from the death of an Iraqi prisoner who prosecutors said was punched, karate-kicked and dragged by the throat while in their custody.  The military prosecutor, Capt. Leon Francis, said Nagen Sadoon Hatab, a high-ranking member of the Baath Party, was among three prisoners "of notoriety" brought to a detention facility in southern Iraq last June. Hatab, 52, had been left lying naked, covered in his own feces, for hours when he was found dead.  read more

 

Seven Iraqi police killed in attacks

Robert H. Reid, AP

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apus_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq 

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Insurgents fired a rocket at the headquarters of the U.S.-led coalition Monday night after gunmen killed seven Iraqi policemen in a pair of attacks west of Baghdad. A senior Iraqi official blamed al-Qaida for many of the suicide bombings around the country in recent weeks.  In the north, military divers searched the muddy waters of the Tigris River for three missing U.S. soldiers, including two pilots of an OH-58D Kiowa Warrior helicopter that crashed Sunday in Mosul during rescue operations after a patrol boat capsized.  Read More

 

Kerry hits out at Bush over Iraq
The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uselections2004/story/0,13918,1131526,00.html 

Is Kerry Changing his tune on the war?

Sen. John Kerry, the Viet-nam vet-eran who is leading opinion polls ahead of tomorrow's crucial Democratic primary in New Hampshire, has sharply criticised the US president, George Bush, over his decision to invade Iraq.  Brushing off an attack by his Democratic rival Wesley Clark, the former general who claimed that Mr Kerry's "yes" vote in the Senate helped to hand the president a "blank cheque" for war in Iraq, the Massachusetts senator compared Iraq with the stalemate in Vietnam 30 years ago and called for an independent inquiry into the reasons America went to war.  read more

 

Human Rights Watch: Iraq invasion not justified
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/061E2DDF-D836-4E95-97D3-5CCD7FADD205.htm

The war in Iraq ended a brutal regime but there were no ongoing human rights violations on a scale which could justify the US-led invasion, Human Rights Watch has said in its annual report.  Although Saddam Hussein had an atrocious human rights record, his worst actions occurred long before the war and there was no ongoing or imminent mass killing in Iraq when the conflict began, the advocacy group said. read more

 

Day 270: January 25, 2004

 

No WMD in Iraq before war, says Kay
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/7ECE4398-8057-49B2-8B13-1B3D7F7CADCB.htm 

Kay: The weapons did not exist, we've got to deal with that

Resigning chief US weapons inspector David Kay has said he did not think Iraq had weapons of mass destruction when US-led forces invaded the country.   In an interview with National Public Radio on Sunday, the ex-inspector said he led the search to find truth and weapons – but found neither.   "The weapons did not exist, we've got to deal with that … and understand why." Asked if he thought President George Bush owed the American public an explanation for the failure to find banned WMD, he added: "The intelligence community owes the president rather than the president owing the American people."  Kay stepped down Friday as leader of the Iraq Survey Group, which 10 months after the US and British invasion of Iraq has yet to find any chemical or biological weapons.  The failure has become a major embarrassment for Washington after it made WMD the central element of its case for war against Iraq.  read more

 

Day 269: January 24, 2004

 

Blair admits: I know my job is on the line
The Observer

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/iraq/story/0,12956,1130815,00.html 
Tony Blair put his political future on the line last night when he admitted for the first time that he considered his job was 'at risk' 48 hours ahead of the two-pronged attack of tuition fees and the Hutton report. Saying that the findings of Lord Hutton on the death of weapons expert David Kelly would be a judgment on his integrity, the Prime Minister added that whatever the political problems he faced, it was better to take tough decisions than to look for an easier political life. 'I think in this job you spend the entire time at risk, so there is not a moment when you are not,' he said in an interview with The Observer. read more

 

Twelve dead in Iraq resistance attacks
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/02FF8355-780F-4C4C-BDB6-B2DC82436DD3.htm
Five US occupation soldiers and seven Iraqis were killed in a series of bombings and shootings in Iraq on Saturday.  The US occupation soldiers were killed in two attacks near the western city of Fallujah.  A car laden with explosives ploughed into a military checkpoint west of Baghdad and exploded, killing three US soldiers and wounding six, the US military and witnesses said.  Three US soldiers "were killed and six were wounded when a vehicle-borne IED (improvised explosive device) detonated at Khaldiyah," 95km west of Baghdad, a US military spokesman said.  read more

 

US soldiers killed in Iraqi car bombing
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/F1D3CD4A-DC49-4575-B9C0-87BEC4338B58.htm 
Three US occupation soldiers have been killed and six others wounded in a car bomb blast in the western Iraqi town of Khaldiyah.  An undetermined number of Iraqi civilians have also been wounded.  "Three Task Force all American soldiers were killed and six were wounded when a vehicle loaded with explosives detonated at Khaldiyah," a US military spokesman said. Locals said the vehicle blew up at a military post in the town, 95 km west of Baghdad.  The blast in Khaldiyah tops a bloody day of resistance attacks across Iraq, that left another 10 people dead including two US soldiers and three Iraqi policemen.  read more

 

Bomb kills 2 in central Iraq; UN experts arrive in Baghdad; US Helicopter Down
Associated Press

http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=386391&contrassID=1&subContrassID=8&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y 
BAGHDAD - Two Iraqis were killed when a truck bomb exploded soon after a U.S. patrol passed by in a restive central city Saturday as two United Nations security experts arrived in the capital to study the possible return of international staff. Meanwhile, a top Shi'ite Muslim leader declared that a U.S.-backed plan for handing power to Iraqis was "unacceptable," while two American pilots were killed when their helicopter crashed. read more

 

New inspector seeks answers on Iraq arms

Katherine Pfelger, AP

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq Weapons

The new inspector leading the search for Iraqi weapons says his job is to seek answers to questions that have dominated much of his career. "My goal is to find out what happened on the ground. What was the status of the Iraqi weapons program? What was their game plan? What were the goals of the regime? To find out what is the ground truth," said Charles Duelfer, named Friday to replace David Kay as head of the U.S. weapons inspection team in Iraq.  Duelfer, the No. 2 U.N. weapons inspector in Iraq for much of the 1990s, will lead roughly 1,400 scientists and other experts of the Iraq Survey Group combing through documents, searching facilities and interviewing Iraqis to determine the capabilities of the fallen government.  Kay spent nearly eight months searching for, but not finding, Saddam Hussein's purported weapons of mass destruction. Kay came home to the United States for the holidays and did not return to Iraq. He could not be reached for comment Friday. At the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland  read more

 

Day 268: January 23, 2004

 

Halliburton Tells Pentagon Workers Took Kickbacks to Award Projects in Iraq

By Neil King Jr., The Wall Street Journal

http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/012404C.shtml 

Halliburton Co. has told the Pentagon that two employees took kickbacks valued at up to $6 million in return for awarding a Kuwaiti-based company with lucrative work supplying U.S. troops in Iraq, Friday's Wall Street Journal reported.  The disclosure is the first firm indication of corruption involving U.S.- funded projects in Iraq and raises new questions about Halliburton's dealings there. The company's work already is being scrutinized because of accusations that the U.S. government was overcharged for gasoline under another controversial contract.  

read more

 

Iraqi cleric urges end to demonstrations
Sammer N. Yacoub, AP

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq 
Iraq's most influential Shiite cleric Friday urged his followers to stop holding demonstrations for early elections until a U.N. team decides whether polls are feasible.  The call by Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani is good news for the U.S.-led administration, which says early elections to choose an Iraqi government are impossible because of the country's precarious security.  Underlining the U.S. concerns, a bomb planted at an Iraqi Communist Party office Thursday killed two men in an apparent attack on supporters of the U.S.-backed government.  Nine other people including two American soldiers were killed in attacks by pro-Saddam Hussein insurgents on U.S. forces, Iraqi civilians and Iraqi police in an upsurge of violence after relative calm during the last two weeks.  read more

 

Nine die in attacks in Iraq's Sunni triangle
Reuters

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1129495,00.html 
 

Reuters

Five Iraqi civilians survived the attack

Guerrillas attacked an Iraqi police checkpoint near Falluja with rifle fire and a grenade yesterday, killing two policemen and a civilian, hours after a mortar attack on a US base had killed two soldiers and wounded one.  On Wednesday, four Christian Iraqi women working as cooks and cleaners at a military base west of Baghdad were killed and six wounded when the bus taking them home from work was attacked. read more

 

Day 267: January 22, 2004

 

VIOLENCE SWEEPS ACROSS IRAQ

Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/8D4028BA-FA15-4069-A9F0-CCD49B09B5D4.htm
Seven Iraqis have been killed in a wave of attacks across Iraq in the last 24 hours as US military officials report that two soldiers have also been killed.  Two Iraqi policemen were killed on Thursday and three others wounded when gunmen opened fire on a police checkpoint between the flashpoint towns of Falluja and Ramadi, hotspots of anti-occupation attacks west of Baghdad. The attack occurred on the same road where the day before, four Iraqi civilian women were killed when assailants opened fire on the car they were travelling near the US military base at Habbaniyah, 80km west of the capital. They were laundry workers at the base.  read more

 

Day 266: January 21, 2004

 

Iraqi Shia demonstrate for third day

Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/B48BE2C7-7E79-411E-A444-63AC636006E8.htm 

Leading Shia cleric al-Sistani is demanding immediate elections

Thou-sands of Iraqi Shia have taken to the streets for a third consecutive day in support of demands made by their leading spiritual leader for direct elections.  The demonstration took place on Wednesday in the southern Iraqi town of Samawa, a day after similar protests in the southern towns of Najaf and Karbala. They mark growing support for Grand Ayat Allah al-Sistani's rejection of US plans for the country. The latest demonstration came less than 48 hours after the arrival of a contingent of Japanese troops on a humanitarian mission to the poverty-hit town. read more

 

Anti-globalisation march brings Mumbai to a standstill
The Guardian

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/B48BE2C7-7E79-411E-A444-63AC636006E8.htm 
Tens of thousands of activists brought the Mumbai traffic to a standstill today as they marched through the streets of India's financial capital to mark the end of the World Social Forum - the world's biggest anti-globalisation gathering.  The march was led by protesters carrying a huge black banner that read: "Stop the killings. Stop the lying." Others waved red and white flags and showed the thumbs-down sign while shouting: "George Bush, no, no. George Bush, terrorist."  The march brought to an end six days of colourful protests and intense discussions about global economic policy, the war in Iraq and racial and caste oppression, among other issues.  Some 100,000 people, from 132 countries, attended the forum, timed as a counterpoint to the World Economic Forum, which opens today in Davos, Switzerland. The alternative gathering is intended to highlight the paradox of big businesses thriving alongside widespread human despair.  read more

 

Day 265: January 20, 2004

 

Iraq cleric could force transfer of power

Hamza Hendawi, AP

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/B48BE2C7-7E79-411E-A444-63AC636006E8.htm
If an influential Shiite cleric sticks to his demand for early legislative elections, then the coalition may turn sovereignty over to the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council, coalition and Iraqi officials said Tuesday.  One top Iraqi official said the cleric would accept a transfer of power to the Governing Council as a way out of the standoff. Transferring power to the Governing Council was among options under study if the United Nations fails to convince Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani that early elections are not feasible, coalition officials told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.  read more

 

SISTANI: INDEPENDENT Iraqi experts wanted for election probe

Hamza Hendawi, AP

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq Politics

Iraq's leading Shiite Muslim cleric wants Iraqi experts - and not just those from the United Nations - to conclude that early elections are not feasible before he will drop his opposition to the U.S. political blueprint for Iraq, an aide said Thursday. Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani also is adamant that the U.S.-led occupation must meet a July 1 deadline to hand over sovereignty to an Iraqi government.  read more

 

Day 264: January 19, 2004

 

100,000 demand Iraqi elections
Associated Press

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1126468,00.html

Sistani has called for direct elections

Tens of thousands of Shia Muslims march in Baghdad carrying portraits of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani and other Shia clerics to demand an elected government. Tens of thousands of Shia Muslims demonstrated in Baghdad today to demand prompt elections, the protest coming hours before US and Iraqi officials prepared to seek UN approval for their plans to transfer power in Iraq. A delegation headed by the US chief administrator in Iraq, Paul Bremer, is in New York for a meeting later today with the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, hoping to persuade the world body to play a greater role in the transition of power in Baghdad.  But Mr Annan has been reluctant to embrace further UN involvement in Iraq until he is convinced that the country is safe. In August last year, a suicide truck bomber targeted the UN's Baghdad operation, killing 20 people including the UN special representative in Iraq, Sergio Vieira de Mello. read more

 

UN considers Iraq election mediation
AFP

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-adv/advertisers/popunders/classesUSA_oct03.html 

The United Nations is considering sending a team to Iraq which the US hopes will quell Iraqi opposition to its plans for a new government.  UN Secretary General Kofi Annan said on Monday he could not immediately authorise sending a team to study the feasibility of direct elections before the US hands over power in July.But with the leader of Iraq's Shia Muslims pressing for a national vote, the UN chief said he would consider the request put forward by the US occupation administrator in Iraq, Paul Bremer.  Annan made the statement after meeting with Bremer and a delegation from the handpicked Iraqi Governing Council in New York. "The stability of Iraq should be everyone's business. I think we have an opportunity to work together to try and move forward," Annan said. He said he would take a decision after UN experts consider the request.  read more
 

Day 263: January 18, 2004

 

Blood, Bewilderment and Rage

Pamela Constable, Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A27529-2004Jan18.html
BAGHDAD - At 8 a.m. Sunday, Abdullah Daud was waiting in a long line at a checkpoint outside the U.S. administration headquarters, hoping to be chosen for a day's construction work inside. By 10 a.m., Daud lay on an emergency room cot, blood seeping through bandages on his head.   "I don't know what kind of Iraqi could do something like this against other Iraqis, exactly at the time when the checkpost would be most crowded," said Daud, 26, his voice shaking with bewildered rage as he described what he had seen: a pickup truck exploding a few yards away from him as dozens of people filed in to work, women screaming, men rushing to help the wounded, bodies falling, a girl with her feet blown off. read more

 

Day 262: January 17, 2004

 

U.N. Return To Iraq ‘Terrible Mistake’: Former Envoy 

"They no longer see the U.N. as a friendly organization. It is a deadly one through their eyes"

Mustafa Abdel-Halim, Islam Online

http://www.islamonline.org/English/News/2004-01/17/article02.shtml

CAIRO, January 17 (IslamOnline.net) - Former U.N. official Denis Halliday said it would be a "terrible mistake" for the United Nations to return to occupied Iraq, adding the organization should be restructured for the sake of world peace and justice.  "The U.N. should not be in Iraq lest it would give legal respectability to the invasion and occupation of the oil-rich Arab country, or further promote the impression that it has collaborated against the Iraqi people," Halliday told IslamOnline.net in an exclusive interview.

U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan is to meet with an Iraqi delegation and U.S. civil administrator in Iraq Paul Bremer on Monday, January 19, amid reports that the world body is mulling to send a small team to Baghdad within two weeks.  Halliday, a former U.N. Humanitarian Coordinator in Iraq, believed the situation is precarious for the step, asserting that ordinary Iraqis feel resentful of – and betrayed by - the United Nations.  "They no longer see the U.N. as a friendly organization. It is a deadly one through their eyes, as they had suffered under the totally bankrupt – if not illegal and immoral - concept of sanctions," he said. read more

 

Deadliest attacks in Iraq war so far (A Summary)
ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Iraq%20Deadly%20Days%20Glance

A look at some of the deadliest days of attacks in Iraq since the war began March 20. President Bush declared major combat over on May 1:
-Jan. 17, 2004: Number of American service members who have died reaches 500 after roadside bomb explodes near Baghdad, killing three U.S. soldiers and two Iraqi civil defense troopers.
-Jan. 9: Bomb explodes as worshippers leave Shiite mosque, killing five people and wounding dozens. Police defuse car bomb outside another nearby mosque.
-Jan. 8: U.S. Black Hawk medevac helicopter apparently shot down, crashes near Fallujah killing all nine soldiers aboard.  read more

 

Day 261: January 16, 2004

 

Women in Iraq Decry Decision To Curb Rights
Council Backs Islamic Law on Families

Pamela Constable, Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A21321-2004Jan15.html

BAGHDAD, Jan. 15 -- For the past four decades, Iraqi women have enjoyed some of the most modern legal protections in the Muslim world, under a civil code that prohibits marriage below the age of 18, arbitrary divorce and male favoritism in child custody and property inheritance disputes. Saddam Hussein's dictatorship did not touch those rights. But the U.S.-backed Iraqi Governing Council has voted to wipe them out, ordering in late December that family laws shall be "canceled" and such issues placed under the jurisdiction of strict Islamic legal doctrine known as sharia.  This week, outraged Iraqi women -- from judges to cabinet ministers -- denounced the decision in street protests and at conferences, saying it would set back their legal status by centuries and could unleash emotional clashes among various Islamic strains that have differing rules for marriage, divorce and other family issues.  read  more

 

Day 260: January 15, 2004

 

U.S. Soldiers' Suicide Rate Is Up in Iraq
Matt Kelley, Associated Press

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-military-suicides,0,2247168.story?coll=sns-ap-nationworld-headlines

U.S. soldiers in Iraq are killing themselves at a high rate despite the work of special teams sent to help troops deal with combat stress, the Pentagon's top doctor said Wednesday.  Meanwhile, about 2,500 soldiers who have returned from the war on terrorism are having to wait for medical care at bases in the United States, said Dr. William Winkenwerder, assistant secretary of defense for health affairs. The problem of troops on "medical extension" is likely to get worse as the Pentagon rotates hundreds of thousands of troops into and out of Iraq this spring, he said.Both situations illustrate the stresses placed on the troops and the military's health system by the war in Iraq.  read more

 

Day 259: January 14, 2004

 

More allegations that Bush lied about reasons for invading Iraq
By Emad Mekay , InterPress Service

http://www.manilatimes.net/national/2004/jan/14/yehey/opinion/20040114opi6.html
A flurry of recent reports and statements supports accusations that the Bush administration misrepresented evidence of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) to go to war in Iraq. The latest claims come from a former Cabinet minister, who says President George W. Bush was planning to invade Iraq from his first day in office in 2001. According to former treasury secretary Paul O’Neill, Bush was also dishonest about his reasons for invading Iraq.  In numerous interviews over the weekend, O’Neill said the plan to unseat Saddam Hussein was well under way long before the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States. read more

 

Bush Flees Iraq Mess On The Campaign Express
Last Copter Out of Baghdad
by Rick Perlstein, Village Voices (January 14 - 20, 2004)

http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0402/perlstein.php 

prosperous, and democratic republic, a light unto the Middle Eastern nations. The decision makers in the administration now realize these goals are unreachable. So they've set a new goal: to end the occupation by July 1, whether that occupation has accomplished anything valuable and lasting or not. Just declare victory and go home. The tyranny of Saddam Hussein will be over. But a new tyranny will likely take its place: the tyranny of civil war, as rival factions rush into the void. Such is the mess this president seems willing to leave behind in order to save his campaign.   "The Bush game plan is to have pictures of some U.S. troops leaving and the Iraqis opening their own government, the U.S. having presided over the birth of this new embryonic democracy," observes former Clinton White House adviser Sidney Blumenthal. The problem is, there will be no Iraqi democracy. There might not even be a viable Iraqi government. Instead, Baghdad will become Beirut: Iraq's three major religious and ethnic groups, the Sunnis, the Shiites, and the Kurds, will consolidate their respective positions in the center, south, and north of the country, recruit their militias, and get down to fighting for control of the power vacuum that is the post-war "peace."  Once again, as so often in these last few months, an analogy is Vietnam. And, as so often in the last three years, the analogous president is Nixon. read more

 

Day 258: January 13, 2004

 

Troops wound seven Iraqis in shooting

Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/8EA4F2D1-9A04-4354-A433-A67D92DEB910.htm 

Residents point to a bread bowl hit by gunfire

Ukranian soldiers have shot and wounded seven Iraqi civilians in response to an attack on their convoy in the tense town of Ramadi, residents said.   Witnesses said US soldiers fired randomly after their vehicle was hit by a roadside bomb. The soldiers then raided houses in the area.  A spokesman for the US-led coalition said Ukrainian soldiers in the area had fired warning shots when protestors started to move toward the troops, but did not report any casualties.  read more

 

Day 257: January 12, 2004

War College Study: WAR ON TERRORISM IS AN 'OPEN-ENDED AND GRATUITOUS CONFLICT'
Chuck Neubauer and Ken Silverstein, LA Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-terror12jan12,1,6125031.story?coll=la-headlines-world 

A report published by the Army War College criticizes the Bush administration's global war on terrorism, stating "The global war on terrorism as presently defined and conducted is strategically unfocused, promises much more than it can deliver, and threatens to dissipate U.S. military and other resources in an endless and hopeless search for absolute security... The United States may be able to defeat, even destroy, Al Qaeda, but it cannot rid the world of terrorism, much less evil." read more

 

Iraqis protest against Amara killings
Occupation forces opened fire, killing five Iraqi protesters
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/E4EE8BBA-F2D2-4A43-92E4-ACCAE2727313.htm 
Crowds of Iraqis gathered outside local government offices in the southeastern city of Amara on Sunday to protest against the killing of at least five people by Iraqi police and British troops a day earlier. Police and occupation British forces opened fire on demonstrators in Amara on Saturday, saying the crowds threw grenades and stones as a protest against unemployment turned violent. Hospital sources said at least seven people were wounded.  Witnesses said scores of Iraqis, many of them relatives of those killed on Saturday, staged another protest in Amara on Sunday morning, demanding compensations. read more

 

Day 256: January 11, 2004

 

SEVEN Iraqi protesters shot dead

Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/3DB4DABF-E0C8-4123-8DE2-FD4FF9116B9E.htm 
A confrontation between police and demonstrators in the south eastern Iraqi city of Amara has left at least seven people dead.  Hospital and police sources said six people were killed on Saturday after Iraqi policemen opened fire on a group of stone-throwing protesters. Another Iraqi was shot and killed by a British soldier.  The Iraqi police opened fire after protesters, who were demanding jobs, began throwing stones at the headquarters of the provincial government in the city. Another seven people were injured.  read more

 

Saddam's Ouster Planned In '01?
CBS News

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0110-03.htm 
The Bush Administration began laying plans for an invasion of Iraq, including the use of American troops, within days of President Bush's inauguration in January of 2001 -- not eight months later after the 9/11 attacks as has been previously reported. read more

 

Day 255: January 10, 2004

 

Rice: US not sure of Syria hiding WMD
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/2EF693EA-BCC0-4EEB-B90A-F9424043705F.htm 

Rice: Not sure if Syria has WMD

The White House has said that it lacks “hard evidence” that would confirm claims that Iraqi chemical and biological weapons were smuggled into Syria before the US-led war in March.  National security advisor Condoleezza Rice commented on the claims from unnamed sources and Syrian dissidents on Friday. "I want to be very clear: We don't, at this point, have any indications that I would consider credible and firm that that has taken place. But we will tie down every lead," said national security adviser Condoleezza Rice. However, Rice refused to rule out the scenario raised by Paris-based Syrian dissident Nizar Nayyouf who told Britain's independent Channel Five News that a senior Syrian military intelligence source had told him about the weapons. "There hasn't been any hard evidence that such a thing happened," Rice told reporters, but "I can't dismiss anything that we haven't had an opportunity to fully assess."  read more

 

Five killed in Iraq mosque bombing
third bombing at an Iraqi mosque since June

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/E9EE56B0-C469-4D7B-B1B1-408128A08CFB.htm 
Al Jazeera

At least five people have been killed and dozens of others injured in a bomb blast at a Shia mosque in the central Iraqi town of Baquba, local police and witnesses have said.   The blast occurred on Friday after the end of the main weekly prayers. Local police and witnessess said the bomb exploded outside a small mosque in a residential area. Officials at a nearby hospital said they knew of 39 people injured.  It was not clear whether it was a car bomb.  Baquba, 65 km north of Baghdad, is a hotbed of resistance to the US-led occupation of Iraq.  The attack comes a day after nine US personnel were killed when their military helicopter crashed in the hotbed city of Falluja. Witnesses said it had been brought down by a missile.  read more

 

Day 254: January 9, 2004

 

Huge Movement of Troops Is Underway
Bradley Graham, Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A1773-2004Jan8.html
The Pentagon has begun a shift of troops into and out of Iraq, Kuwait and Afghanistan that promises to be the most challenging movement of U.S. forces in more than half a century, military officials announced yesterday. In the past week, ships loaded with equipment from the 1st Cavalry Division in Texas and the 25th Infantry Division in Hawaii have departed for the Persian Gulf. The first 200 members of the 101st Airborne Division returned from Iraq earlier this week to their home base at Fort Campbell, Ky. And Wednesday saw the departure from Fort Bragg, N.C., of paratroopers of the 504th Parachute Regiment of the 82nd Airborne Division.  An advance team from the Army's III Corps -- whose commander, Lt. Gen. Thomas Metz, is due to take operational control of the new force -- has also gone to Baghdad.

read more

 

Day 253: January 8, 2004

 

U.S. helicopter crashes near Fallujah; nine killed
By Sameer N. Yacoub, Associated Press

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2001832252_webiraqcrash08.html 

No Survivors

FALLUJAH, Iraq — A U.S. Black Hawk medivac helicopter crashed today near this stronghold of the anti-American insurgency, killing all nine soldiers aboard, the U.S. military said. A witness said the helicopter was hit in the tail by a rocket. The military also said a U.S. soldier died Wednesday of injuries suffered in a mortar attack that wounded 33 other troops and a civilian west of Baghdad.  Hundreds of angry Iraqis, meanwhile, waited outside Baghdad's infamous Abu Ghraib prison for a much-publicized release of detainees that did not occur by late afternoon.  There were no survivors among the nine American soldiers aboard the medical evacuation helicopter that crashed about 2:20 p.m. while making an "emergency landing" near Fallujah, said Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt in Baghdad. The cause of the crash was unknown, he said. read more

 

BLAIR: "I WOULD QUIT IF I LIED"

The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/hutton/story/0,13822,1118318,00.html

Blair: Did he lie about Kelly?

Tony Blair was forced on to the defensive yesterday when he admitted that he would have to resign as prime minister if he lied to parliament over his role in the outing of the government scientist, Dr David Kelly.  As Lord Hutton warned Britain's political classes against jumping to conclusions ahead of the publication of his report, the prime minister said he "of course" accepted that ministers who misled MPs had to quit. read more

 

US soldier killed, dozens injured in Iraq
Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/7D1C540D-1799-4CE2-A5F5-35D26E352DEF.htm 
One US occupation soldier has been killed and thirty-four have been wounded after resistance fighters fired mortar rounds at a US base. "One soldier was killed and 34 wounded," revealed a US spokesman on Thursday.  Late on Wednesday, six mortar rounds slammed into Logistical Base Seitz, west of Baghdad, said a US military spokesman in a statement. read more

 

U.S. Plays Down Withdrawal of Iraq Weapons Team
Reuters
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20040108/pl_nm/iraq_weapons_bush_dc&cid=615&ncid=1478
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (Reuters) - The White House on Thursday played down the withdrawal from Iraq of a 400-member military team specializing in the disposal of weapons of mass destruction. Scott McClellan, spokesman for President Bush, said that even though the disposal team was leaving, the group focused on hunting weapons was remaining in Iraq. "The Iraq Survey Group continues to do its work," McClellan told reporters aboard Air Force One. Bush was en route to Tennessee for an event on school reform and a fund-raiser.  The New York Times reported on Thursday that the departure of the team was "a sign that the administration might have lowered its sights" and viewed it as less likely that chemical and biological weapons would be discovered. The administration had cited the threat of illicit weapons as a principle reason for launching war on Iraq in March of last year.  McClellan said, "We already know from (the Iraq Survey Group's) interim report that Saddam Hussein's regime was in serious violation" of United Nations disarmament demands.  In a potential setback to the so far fruitless hunt for banned weapons, the head of the Iraq Survey Group, David Kay, told administration officials last month he was considering leaving his job.  read more
 

Think Tank: U.S. Overstated Iraqi Threat
Barry Schweid, Associated Press

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20040108/pl_nm/iraq_weapons_bush_dc&cid=615&ncid=1478 

WASHINGTON - Iraq posed no imminent threat to the United States and there was no solid evidence that President Saddam Hussein was cooperating with the al-Qaida terror network, a private think tank maintained Thursday.  The administration systematically misrepresented a weapons threat from Iraq, and U.S. strategy should be revised to eliminate the policy of unilateral preventive war, said Jessica T. Mathews, Joseph Cirincione and George Perkovich of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.  Years of U.N. inspections to determine whether Saddam was harboring weapons of mass destruction were working well, and the United States should set up jointly with the United Nations a permanent system to guard against the spread of dangerous technology, the report said.  It recommended that consideration be given to making the job of CIA director a career post instead of a political appointment.   Mathews is president, Cirincione is director of the proliferation project, and Perkovich is vice president for studies at Carnegie, an independent research group.  Citing the CIA and other U.S. intelligence offices, the Bush administration claimed before attacking Iraq that Saddam had potent caches of weapons of mass destruction and plans to produce more of them.   The Carnegie report said the U.S. intelligence process failed on Iraq and that Bush administration officials dropped qualifications presented to them by U.S. intelligence analysts.  Several U.S. allies, including France, Germany and Russia, sought continuation of U.N. weapons searches, but President Bush went ahead with the war that toppled Saddam and thrust the United States into trying to steer the oil-rich country through reconstruction and toward democracy. In the weeks before the war, the administration also intensified its allegations of links between Saddam and the al-Qaida terror network headed by Osama bin Laden and believed responsible for a series of attacks on the United States, including those against the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001. Since May, when Bush declared an end to major combat, 357 U.S. service personnel have died in attacks on them and in accidents.   read more

 

Day 252: January 7, 2004

 

Iraq's Arsenal Was Only on Paper
Since Gulf War, Nonconventional Weapons Never Got Past the Planning Stage

Barton Gellman, Washington Post

http://www.endthewar.org/features/onlypaper.htm

Modher Sadeq-Saba Tamimi, top Iraqi missile expert

Of all Iraq's rocket scientists, none drew warier scrutiny abroad than Modher Sadeq-Saba Tamimi.
An engineering PhD known for outsized energy and gifts, Tamimi, 47, designed and built a new short-range missile during Iraq's four-year hiatus from United Nations arms inspections. Inspectors who returned in late 2002, enforcing Security Council limits, ruled that the Al Samoud missile's range was not quite short enough. The U.N. team crushed the missiles, bulldozed them into a pit and entombed the wreckage in concrete.  read more

 

UK PAys out for Iraqi civilian deaths

Richard Norton-Taylor, The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1117599,00.html 
The British government has paid compensation believed to amount to thousands of pounds to three families of Iraqi civilians allegedly killed by British troops, it was disclosed yesterday.
A further 13 claims following the deaths of Iraqi civilians are being investigated, the Ministry of Defence said.   One of the payments has been made to the family of Baha Mousa, the son of a police colonel, who died allegedly after being assaulted with seven other young Iraqis by British soldiers in Basra last September.   A British army death certificate is reported to state that Mr Mousa died of "asphyxia".  One of the survivors of the alleged incident is reported to have suffered serious kidney failure. read more

 

Day 251: January 6, 2004

 

Two Frenchmen shot dead in Iraq

Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/D2977D8B-15CA-4636-8743-198CB34BDCCC.htm

Resistance to the US occupation in Falluja is fierce

Two French nationals have been killed and a third wounded in a drive-by shooting in the Iraqi town of Falluja.  French foreign ministry spokesman Herve Ladsous said on Tuesday that the French nationals were in Iraq working for US companies, tasked with rebuilding infrastructure in and around Baghdad.  They were driving in a convoy near Falluja, west of the Iraqi capital, when their car broke down, diplomats said.  The occupants of a passing vehicle shot at the French men, killing two and wounding the third.   read more

 

Day 250: January 5, 2004

 

Dutch Troops Find Depleted Uranium Ammunition In Iraq

Finding points to more DU material in the area

UN Observer

http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/HL0401/S00010.htm

Dutch troops stationed in the province of Al Muthanna in Southern Iraq have found a 30 mm round of depleted uranium (DU) ammunition.  This has been announced by the Ministry of Defence today. According to RISQ Associate Maarten H.J. van den Berg, the finding points to

the presence of more DU material in the area.  The shell was found on the 10th of December in a so-called `demolition pit' in the town of As Samawah. According to a spokesperson of the Dutch Ministry of Defence, the health of those involved in the finding was not put at risk as the round was not destroyed and no DU dust released.  Given the reported calibre, the shell is probably of US origin.  According to Mr. van den Berg, 30 mm DU ammunition has only been used in Iraq by American Apache helicopters and A-10 `Warthog' jets of the US Air Force.

read more

 

Day 249: January 4, 2004

 

Saddam's capture: was a deal brokered behind the scenes?

When it emerged that the Kurds had captured the Iraqi dictator, the US celebrations evaporated. David Pratt asks whether a secret political trade-off has been engineered

David Pratt, The Sunday Herald Online

http://www.sundayherald.com/39096

For a story that three weeks ago gripped the world's imagination, it has now all but dropped off the radar. Peculiar really, for if one thing might have been expected in the aftermath of Saddam Hussein's capture, it was the endless political and media mileage that the Bush administration would get out of it . After all, for 249 days Saddam's elusiveness had been a symbol of America's ineptitude in Iraq, and, at last, with his capture came the long-awaited chance to return some flak to the Pentagon's critics. It also afforded the opportunity to demonstrate the effectiveness of America's elite covert and intelligence units such as Task Force 20 and Greyfox . And it was a terrific chance for the perfect photo-op showing the American soldier, and Time magazine's 'Person of the Year', hauling 'High Value Target Number One' out of his filthy spiderhole in the village of al- Dwar. Then along came that story: the one about the Kurds beating the US Army in the race to find Saddam first, and details of Operation Red Dawn suddenly began to evaporate. read more

 

Power Transfer in Iraq Starts This Week
Deadline for Completion Is Set as Talks Continue
Robin Wright and Rajiv Chandrasekaran, Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52841-2004Jan3.html?referrer=email
After eight months of debate and delay, the United States this week will formally launch the handover of power to Iraq with the final game plan still not fully in place.  The United States begins the complicated political, economic and security transfer with a general framework and a June 30 deadline for completion. But critical details are still being negotiated between the Iraqis and U.S. administrator L. Paul Bremer, some of which could determine whether the new Iraqi government is ultimately embraced by the majority of Iraq's 22 million people.  read more

 

Day 248: January 3, 2004

 

Extended Iraq Duty Expected for More Troops

To stem an exodus of personnel, the Army may prohibit additional soldiers in crucial units from retiring, leaving when enlistment ends or being reassigned.
Esther Schrader, The Los Angeles Times

http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/010404E.shtml 

Desperate to stretch its limited ranks, the Army is expected next week to prohibit still more soldiers now in Iraq and soon to be deployed there from leaving military service.  Army officials declined to say which or how many soldiers would be affected when it expands its "stop-loss" program, which prevents soldiers in certain heavily used specialties from leaving the military or being reassigned to another unit. But the last such edict, issued Nov. 13, covered the more than 110,000 active-duty soldiers whose units were scheduled to deploy to Iraq and Afghanistan between now and May. Because the order takes effect 90 days before the troops' 12-month deployments and lasts for 90 days after a return home, those troops couldn't retire or leave the Army before spring 2005, even if their enlistments expired before then. read more

 

Day 247: January 2, 2004

 

MR BUSH HAS ONE PRIORITY FOR 2004: GET AMERICA OUT OF IRAQ. FAST.

Robert Fisk, The Independent

http://www.robert-fisk.com/articles342.htm#FullStory

Ever since Daniel Pipes - he of the failed  American neo-cons - piped up last summer with his plan to install a "democratic-minded autocrat" (sic) in Iraq, I have been eyeing the Washington crystal ball for further signs of what the designers of this wretched war have in store for the Iraqis whom they "liberated" for "democracy" last year. And bingo, not long before Christmas, another of those chilling proposals for "New Iraq" popped up from the same right-wing cabal. Any predictions for Iraq this year may thus have to be based on the thoughts of Leslie Gelb, a former chairman of the United States Council on Foreign Relations, whose wretched plans for "liberated" Iraq call for something close to ethnic cleansing.  In no less an organ than The New York Times - the same paper which carried a plea last year that Americans

should accept that US troops will commit "atrocities" in Iraq - appeared Mr Gelb's "Three State Solution", an astonishing combination of simplicity and ruthlessness. It goes like this. America should create three mini- states in Iraq - Kurds in the north, Sunnis in the centre and Shias in the south - the frontiers of these three entities drawn along ethnic, sectarian lines. The "general idea," says Mr Gelb, "is to strengthen the Kurds and Shias and weaken the Sunnis." Thus US forces can extricate themselves from the quagmire of the "Sunni triangle" while the "troublesome and domineering" Sunnis themselves - with no control over Iraq's northern or southern oil fields - will be in a more moderate frame of mind.  read more

 

Day 246: January 1, 2004

 

8 Die in New Year's Car Bomb Blast in Iraq

A car bomb rips through a Baghdad restaurant frequented by foreigners. Eight Times staff members are among the wounded.
Esther Schrader, Tracy Wilkinson and Chris Kraul, Los Angeles Times

http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/010204B.shtml

BAGHDAD — A car bomb tore through a central Baghdad restaurant Wednesday just hours before the beginning of the new year, killing eight people and injuring more than two dozen as a crowd of Iraqis and foreigners gathered for a low-key holiday celebration.  The 9 p.m. blast at the Nabil restaurant came at the end of a violent day of ethnic protests, bombings and attacks on foreign troops as Iraq marked the end of one tumultuous year and the beginning of another.  The explosion hit just hours after an American commander had warned of the potential for attacks over the holiday. The bomb demolished most of the restaurant, a popular eatery surrounded by small gardens in Baghdad's upscale Arasat district, and left a large crater on a side street. "This is a criminal attack and a terrorist act by people who have no morals or ethics," Lt. Gen. Ahmed Ibrahim, Iraq's national police chief, told reporters at the scene. "It was a car bomb filled with TNT explosives."  Initially, five people were reported killed, but today the toll rose to eight, according to Associated Press and Reuters.  Eight Los Angeles Times staff members were among those wounded. Salar Jaff, The Times' Baghdad Bureau office manager, was driving to the restaurant behind three cars carrying his colleagues when the blast hit. "The explosion came, and it was very strong. I thought my car was exploding also," he said.  "I heard the screams. I saw two people putting their hands on their faces all covered with blood and their bodies were bleeding severely," Jaff said. "The glass was everywhere. People were just lying there. The cars were smoking, they were on fire."  read more

 

 

continue to 2003, Day-by-Day Stories from the Occupation