These are the archives for the week ending 9th June 2006
Death of Al-Zarqawi will not drop price of oil
The death of Iraq's al Qaeda leader will not bring more security to the vital oil sector in the country, where political instability and violence will continue to hamper exports and investment, analysts said.
Oil prices fell more than a dollar to below $70 after Iraq announced on Thursday that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, whose group has claimed some of the bloodiest attacks in Iraq, had been killed. Iraq's failure to return oil exports to pre-war levels, due to violence and mismanagement, has fuelled crude's price rally.
"The end of Zarqawi will not be the end of threats to oil exports in Iraq," said Mustafa Alani, an Iraqi expert at the Gulf Research Council in Dubai. "Yes, al Qaeda attacked oil installations but they were not the only actors and they were not the main actors," he said.
"There is also a new factor -- political parties that are using threats against oil to gain leverage." Al Qaeda in Iraq, in an internet statement, vowed to keep fighting U.S.-led forces and the Baghdad government.
Reuters, 8/6/06
British 'military justice' questioned
The system of dealing with British troops accused of abuses while on duty could be in doubt after three soldiers were cleared of killing a 15-year-old Iraqi boy, The Times said. The court made its decision after hearing that the suspected teenage looter drowned after being forced into a canal in southern Iraq in 2003.
The three soldiers' manslaughter acquittals are the latest 'not guilty' verdicts involving British troops. Last November, the trial of seven paratroopers accused of murdering an Iraqi civilian collapsed with the judge strongly criticising the military investigation into the death and the unreliability of the Iraqi witnesses. A similar assessment was made by the panel in the latest hearing about the evidence of another looter, who was the only witness to the youth's drowning near the southern city of Basra.
The Times said Goldsmith would want to know whether Tuesday's case had implications for a pending, high-profile trial of five British soldiers charged in connection with the death of a hotel receptionist, also in Basra.
AFP, 7/6/06
Civilians bear brunt of US attacks
U.S. marines backed by several contingents of Iraqi army have retaken the city of al-Dhaloiya and are conducting house-to-house search amid mounting resentment and fury from the local people. Some residents have sent emails to Azzaman, urging a halt to the attack and what they describe as "oppressive measures" by the troops. They say scores of people have been arrested and several civilians killed or injured in the attack.
The move on Dhaloiya is the latest in a series of attacks in a bid to flush the town and the outlying areas of Iraqi rebels. But residents say the troops, instead of rounding up the rebels, normally pour their wrath on unarmed civilians. The town has been under siege for nearly three weeks and residents say its nearly 50,000 inhabitants are in dire need of basic humanitarian supplies.
The residents say the troops in each attack forbid media representatives from entering the town. As a result, very little leaks out on the large-scale military operations the U.S. marines have been carrying out in these rural areas. Residents speak of large-scale destruction of orchards and infrastructure and scores of casualties in each attack.
Azzaman, Iraq, 7/6/06
The women of Basra have disappeared
The women of Basra have disappeared. Three years after the US-led invasion of Iraq, women's secular freedoms - once the envy of women across the Middle East - have been snatched away because militant Islam is rising across the country.
Across Iraq, a bloody and relentless oppression of women has taken hold. Many women had their heads shaved for refusing to wear a scarf or have been stoned in the street for wearing make-up. Others have been kidnapped and murdered for crimes that are being labelled simply as "inappropriate behaviour".
In the British-occupied south, where Muqtada al-Sadr's Mehdi Army retains a stranglehold, women insist the situation is at its worst. Here they are forced to live behind closed doors only to emerge, concealed behind scarves, hidden behind husbands and fathers. Even wearing a pair of trousers is considered an act of defiance, punishable by death.
Independent, 8/8/06
More civilians killed by US forces
"The US forces have violated human rights many times across Iraq," said Omar al-Juburi, spokesman for the human rights section of the party led by Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi. In the latest in a string of allegations against US forces, Juburi said 29 Iraqis were killed in May in separate incidents in the towns of Latifiyah and Yusifiyah, south of Baghdad, and in the capital itself.
"On May 13, US forces launched an air assault on a civilian car in Latifiyah and killed six people," Juburi told reporters. "On the same day US aircraft attacked the house of a civilian, Saadun Mohsen Hassan, and killed seven members of his family," he added.
Juburi said US forces carried out another air strike the next day on the house of Sheikh Yassin Saleh Shallal in Yusifiyah, "killing 13 people -- including women and children." Three other Iraqis were killed in US raids in Baghdad, he said.
AFP, 6/6/06
Marines deliberately killed innocent Iraqi
Evidence has emerged U.S. Marines deliberately killed an unarmed Iraqi civilian in April in the town of Hamdaniya, CNN reported Tuesday. A military source with knowledge of a U.S. Naval Criminal Investigative Service investigation told the network the victim, identified by Knight Ridder as Hashim Ibrahim Awad, was dragged from his home and shot by Marines, who placed a shovel and AK-47 next to him to make it appear he was an insurgent.
"They went after someone, not necessarily this person, but they set out to get someone," the officer said of the findings.
Washington Times, 6/6/06
Southern Afghanistan 'in state of war'
A state of war is gripping southern Afghanistan and may spread as Taliban fighters learn the bombing skills of guerillas in Iraq and gain public support, a security think tank warned on Tuesday. Emmanuel Reinert, executive director of the Senlis Council, also noted that violence in the country could be rising towards levels in Iraq.
In a report on southern Afghanistan, the Senlis Council said the province of Helmand 'is in a state of war, once again. The nature of instability in Helmand has shifted from random insurgency to a state of prolonged and organised violence that threatens the very foundations of the new Afghanistan'.
Portrayed as a success story following the US-led invasion to oust the Taliban, Afghanistan was growing increasingly hostile to foreign troops as promises of improved livelihood came to nothing, Mr Reinert said.
Its report, 'Helmand at war - the changing nature of insurgency in southern Afghanistan and its effect on the future of the country', found that 80 per cent of the people in the province support guerilla groups. Britain, which took command of the Nato-led forces in the south last month and is deploying in Helmand, must regain control. "Otherwise the whole of southern Afghanistan will be lost to the Taliban insurgents," Mr Reinert said.
AFP, 7/6/06
Death toll rising
The bodies of 6,000 people, most of whom died violently, have been received by Baghdad's main mortuary so far this year, health ministry figures show. The number has risen every month, to 1,400 in May. The majority are believed to be victims of sectarian killings.
But no-one believes these are the true figures from the violence in and around Baghdad as many bodies are not taken to the morgue.
BBC News, 6/6/06
US won't make 'too much' of Haditha criticism
A senior State Department official on Tuesday played down tough criticism by Iraq's prime minister over the Haditha incident, saying "I wouldn't make too much out of" the remarks. Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has strongly condemned the incident in the western Iraqi town of Haditha last November in which U.S. Marines are accused of killing two dozen Iraqi civilians.
The State Department's Iraq coordinator, James Jeffrey, said he believed U.S. forces were well-respected in Iraq and Maliki's outburst was to be expected. "It's a defense mechanism. ... I wouldn't make too much out of it," he said of Maliki's criticism. "There is a constant buzz in Iraq of what our troops did or didn't do."
Reuters, 6/6/06
More troops in southern Afghanistan
Nato is to double its troop numbers in southern Afghanistan when it takes over security from US forces there next month, its force commander says. But Lieutenant-General David Richards promised on Sunday that the incoming force would be more "people-friendly" in an effort to win the support of the local population amid rising resentment towards the US-led coalition over its aggressive tactics. The new force would also have more attack helicopters, he said.
Observers in the south say support for the foreign troops has waned in recent months, partly because of a large number of civilians killed mistakenly in coalition operations and also because of an increased presence of Taliban fighters.
Aljazeera, 5/6/06
180,000 displaced in Iraq
Nearly 180,000 Iraqis have now been displaced due to ongoing sectarian violence, an increase of about 80,000 from previous figures, said government officials.
According to Mowafaq Abdul-Raof, a spokesman for the Ministry of Displacement and Migration, more than 17,000 families are now registered as homeless by the ministry. An additional 5,000, Abdul-Raof added, had found refuge with relatives in less effected areas.
Reuters, 4/6/06
Pentagon to break with Geneva Convention
The Pentagon has decided to omit from new detainee policies a key tenet of the Geneva Convention that bans "humiliating and degrading treatment," according to military officials, a step that would mark a potentially permanent shift away from strict adherence to international human rights standards.
For more than a year, the Pentagon has been redrawing policies on detainees and interrogation, and intends to issue a new Army Field Manual, which, along with accompanying directives, represents core instructions to U.S. soldiers worldwide.
For decades, it was the official policy of the U.S. military to follow minimum standards for treating detainees as laid out in the Geneva Convention. But, in 2002, President Bush suspended portions of the Geneva Convention for captured al Qaeda and Taliban fighters.
Los Angeles Times, 5/6/06
Warlords driven from Mogadishu
Islamic militia appeared to control Mogadishu on Monday after winning a bloody three-month battle against warlords who have run the Somali capital for 15 years. Many of the warlords, widely believed to be covertly backed by Washington, were fleeing to other parts of Somalia or neighbouring Kenya.
If confirmed, it would be the first time control of all of the city had been wrested from Somalia's powerful warlords since they ousted dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991, ushering in years of extreme violence and anarchy. Around 350 people, mostly civilians, have been killed in street battles since February between the Islamic militia and a self-styled anti-terrorism coalition of warlords.
Many analysts view the violence as a proxy war between the United States and Islamic militants. Many Somalis have moved to the Islamic side because of Washington's perceived support for the warlords, residents say.
Reuters, 5/6/06
Basra 'worse than northern ireland'
In a dirt alley strewn with trash and puddles of black sewage an Iraqi teenager smiled at me, slicing his throat with his fingers, as a gang of more than 30 sulky adolescents chanted "Down with Britain" and "Long live the Mehdi Army".
That was just a minor incident in one of Basra's deadliest weekends since the US-led invasion of Iraq three years ago. Increasingly, a city that was once the success story of post-Saddam Iraq resembles war-torn Baghdad. On Saturday a suicide car bomb tore apart a packed street market, killing 28 people. The attack, one of the worst yet in Iraq's second city, was seen by many as a pointed message from Basra's Shia groups to Nuri Maliki, Iraq's Prime Minister, who last week declared a state of emergency. Early yesterday the Shia-dominated police force opened fire on a Sunni mosque in the city. Up to 12 people were killed as the security forces and Sunnis disputed whether those in the mosque were armed or innocent civilians.
Nine British soldier were killed in 50 attacks in May. "You are constantly being watched. They put a name on where you are and what you are doing," said Sergeant Downe, from Bristol. "Every time you are out (the danger) is a constant. One moment civilians will ask you for water. The next they bomb you . . . It's worse than it was in Northern Ireland."
Times, 5/6/06
News coverage of Iraq in US drops
The amount of time devoted to Iraq on the three television networks' weeknight newscasts has dropped by nearly 60 percent from 2003 to the first four months of 2006, according to the independent Tyndall Report tracking service.
Sean Aday, an assistant professor in media and public affairs at George Washington University, reviewed all of the nightly news for NBC and Fox News in 2005 and found that they did not report most U.S. military deaths. Both news outlets also covered an even smaller fraction of violence against Iraqis, he found.
Aday attributed what he called the under-reporting to multiple factors, including the danger faced by journalists reporting the story; that random violence typically occurs outside a camera's view; the sense among news executives that continuing attacks are no longer "news" and; finally, political pressure on the networks.
Aday said that the constant attacks on the media for alleged negative coverage "have got to be in the back of their heads when they make these decisions."
The Day, Connecticut, 4/6/06
Puppet PM rejects whitewash
America's alliance with the new Iraqi government was plunged into major crisis last night as the country's prime minister and its people reacted with fury to the US military clearing its forces of killing civilians during operations against insurgents. Iraqi leaders vowed to press on with their own probe into one of the most notorious American raids against extremist fighters, in the town of Ishaqi, rejecting the US military's exoneration of its forces.
Adnan al-Kazimi, an aide to prime minister Nuri al-Maliki, said the government would also demand an apology from the United States and compensation for the victims in several cases, including the alleged massacre in the town of Haditha last year.
Scotsman, 4/6/06
Demonstration against US support for warlords in Somalia
In Somalia today thousands of angry Muslims denounced the United States of America and the US-backed warlord alliance that are currently fighting Islamic militia in the lawless capital, Mogadishu, and vowed to destroy their opponents.
About 5,000 Muslims gathered in southern Mogadishu and pledged to fight to the death against the alliance, as fierce fighting raged north of the city at the time. Surrounded by heavily armed Islamic militia, the crowd cheered as clerics accused Washington of financing "genocide" in Somalia by bankrolling the Alliance for the Restoration of Peace and Counter-Terrorism (ARPCT).
The rally took place at the same time as new fighting erupted north of Mogadishu in which 11 people were killed bringing the death toll from three months of skirmishes to 327 with more than 1 500 wounded. The ARPCT began operating in February with US support in order to curb the growing influence in Mogadishu of Islamic extremists and foreign fighters, including Al Qaeda members, that America believe are allegedly being harboured by the militia.
African News Dimension, 2/6/06
'Mum factor' slows British recruitment
The "mum factor" is hurting recruitment in Britain's armed forces as mothers discourage their children from joining for fear they will be killed in Iraq, a general said. In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Major General Andrew Ritchie added that troops have suffered a loss of morale because of public opposition to the war and because of legal action against soldiers and officers accused of human rights abuses.
Although Britain's Ministry of Defence expects to meet 85 percent of its recruitment needs for 2005-2006, the shortfall last year rose by more than 300 percent, leaving more than 2,000 vacancies, the newspaper reported.
AFP, 2/6/06
Iraq war hobbles US policy
A proposed deal to end Iran's disputed nuclear program highlights a new reality facing the United States: American intercessions overseas will be seen through the prism of an Iraq war that is highly unpopular around the globe.
With U.S. forces and fortunes lashed to Iraq for years to come, nations that the United States cannot afford to alienate can insist that Washington give diplomacy every chance to succeed before resorting to economic punishment or military force, foreign policy scholars said. Even many American allies believe the Iraq war was avoidable.
"Obviously, Iraq has made a major negative impact on American credibility," said Trita Parsi, a Middle East specialist at Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies.
Associated Press, 2/6/06
Ishaqi clearance puts pressure on puppet PM
A military probe that cleared U.S. troops of killing civilians in the Iraqi town of Ishaqi could not have come at a worse time for the new prime minister, who has promised justice for those killed at Haditha.
Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki is battling a widespread public perception that U.S. troops can shoot and kill with impunity and Iraqi leaders are too weak to do anything about it.
Reuters, 2/6/06
US clears its troops of Ishaqi massacre
A US military investigation has found there was no misconduct by US troops over Iraqi civilian deaths in the town of Ishaqi, a spokesman says. Maj Gen William Caldwell said reports that troops "executed" a family during a raid on a house in March and tried to cover it up were "absolutely false".
A report filed by Iraqi police accused US troops of rounding up and deliberately shooting 11 people in the house in Ishaqi, including five children and four women, before blowing up the building. Four bodies including that of an insurgent were found after the raid while up to nine "collateral deaths" resulted from the US raid, according to the investigation. It added that a precise death toll could not be determined because of collapsed walls and debris.
The outcome of the Pentagon investigation emerged a day after the BBC released video footage that appears to show the aftermath of US action in Ishaqi, about 60 miles north of Baghdad. The video tape obtained by the BBC shows a number of dead adults and children at the site with what our world affairs editor John Simpson says were clearly gunshot wounds.
BBC News, 3/6/06
Iraqi PM attacks daily US attacks
Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki lashed out at the American military on Thursday, denouncing what he characterized as habitual attacks by troops against Iraqi civilians. As outrage over reports that American marines killed 24 Iraqis in the town of Haditha last year continued to shake the new government, the country's senior leaders said that they would demand that American officials turn over their investigative files on the killings and that the Iraqi government would conduct its own inquiry.
In his comments, Mr. Maliki said violence against civilians had become a "daily phenomenon" by many troops in the American-led coalition who "do not respect the Iraqi people." "They crush them with their vehicles and kill them just on suspicion," he said.
New York Times, 2/6/06
US massacre at Ishaqi
The BBC has uncovered new video evidence that US forces may have been responsible for the deliberate killing of 11 innocent Iraqi civilians.
The video appears to challenge the US military's account of events that took place in the town of Ishaqi in March. The US authorities said they were involved in a firefight after a tip-off that an al-Qaeda supporter was visiting the house. According to the Americans, the building collapsed under heavy fire killing four people - a suspect, two women and a child.
But a report filed by Iraqi police accused US troops of rounding up and deliberately shooting 11 people in the house, including five children and four women, before blowing up the building. The video tape obtained by the BBC shows a number of dead adults and children at the site with what our world affairs editor John Simpson says were clearly gunshot wounds.
BBC News, 2/6/06
Iran: US offers talks but plans sanctions
Iran's foreign minister said today his country would welcome direct talks with Washington on Tehran's disputed nuclear program, but rebuffed a U.S. proposal that Iran suspend uranium enrichment as a condition, state-run television reported. On Wednesday, Iran called the offer "a propaganda move."
American allies and many U.S. foreign-policy experts have been urging President Bush and his administration to take part in talks, arguing that unless the U.S. showed a willingness to engage, it could not convince other countries that the time had come to impose penalties on Iran.
Seattle Times, 1/6/06