Morgue body count highlights sectarian bloodshed
09 Aug 2006 11:38:35 GMT

(Updates with five deaths in Baghdad, nine bodies found)

By Alister Bull

BAGHDAD, Aug 9 (Reuters) - About 60 bodies a day were brought to Baghdad's morgue last month, underlining the increase in sectarian bloodshed since an attack in February on a major Shi'ite shrine.

Morgue assistant manager, Doctor Abdul Razzaq al-Obaidi, said on Wednesday about 90 percent of the deaths were caused by violence in the capital, where U.S. and Iraqi forces have increased troop numbers.

"Most of the cases have gunshot wounds to the head. Some of them were strangled and others were beaten to death with clubs," he told Reuters.

The daily drumbeat of violence continues, claiming at least 13 lives and injuring 25 others around the country.

In Baghdad, five people were killed when gunmen opened fire on a street vendor grilling fish in the western district of Jamiaa, an interior ministry source said. Police also found nine bodies of civilians in various parts of the capital.

The July morgue toll of 1,815 compared with 1,595 in June and is the largest since the aftermath of the February bombing of the Golden Mosque of Samarra, blamed by U.S. and Iraqi officials on al Qaeda.

Mounting sectarian violence has prompted fears of civil war, and the United States has boosted troop levels in Baghdad, regarded as the key to security in the whole country, hoping also to shore up confidence in the new Shi'ite-led government.

About 6,000 additional Iraqi forces and 3,500 U.S. soldiers of the 172nd Striker Brigade combat team are being deployed in the Baghdad area and are expected to start systematically clearing neighbourhoods of militants and insurgents.

The first phase of the operation, which began on July 9, killed or captured 411 murderers associated with death squads, the U.S. military said, but it failed to stem the bloodshed.

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Rome court rules on trial of US soldier in Nov
09 Aug 2006 16:45:28 GMT
Source: Reuters

ROME, Aug 9 (Reuters) - A Rome court will decide on Nov. 29 whether to try a U.S. soldier, almost certainly in absentia, for an Italian agent's death in Baghdad while he escorted a freed hostage to safety, a court source said on Wednesday.

Prosecutors want Mario Lozano of the 69th Infantry Regiment to stand trial for manslaughter and attempted double homicide.

Intelligence agent Nicola Calipari was escorting a newly freed Italian hostage when he was shot dead at a checkpoint in March 2005.

A judge will rule in the November hearing whether there is enough evidence for an indictment over the shooting.

The U.S. military exonerated its troops of any blame while Rome said inexperienced, nervous American soldiers and a badly-run road block were at the root of the shooting.

Investigators sought the names of other U.S. soldiers at the Baghdad checkpoint but Washington declined to give them.

Italy's new centre-left government, which opposes the war in Iraq and has brought forward the withdrawal of Italian troops, has criticised the lack of U.S. cooperation.

The case is one of two major investigations by Italian prosecutors into American soldiers and intelligence agents. Milan magistrates have issued arrest warrants for 22 CIA agents over the kidnapping of a Muslim cleric in Milan in 2003

IRAQI PRESS MONITOR, 8 August 06

MOVE TO BRING BASRA FUEL TO IRAQI KURDISTAN VIA IRAN
(Kurdistani Nwe) Fuel shortages have led to growing discontent in Iraqi Kurdistan and Erbil province in particular. Erbil governor Nawzad Hadi told Kurdistani Nwe that the local authorities were planning to deal with the problem by getting fuel from Basra, but admitted there were logistical difficulties, "According to our information there is enough fuel in Basra oil refineries, but because of instable security in the southern and middle parts of Iraq, [it] cannot be brought via roads [through these regions]." The authorities now plan to ask Iran whether the fuel can be transported from Basra to Kurdistan via Iran.
(Kurdistani Nwe is issued daily by the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan.)

August 8, 2006 at 17:46:53

Iraq plans to remove Pentagon's proxy force

by Devlin Buckley

http://www.opednews.com

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki and other top Iraqi officials are calling for the eviction of an anti-Iranian militant group that is reportedly orchestrating attacks and collecting intelligence inside Iran on behalf of the Department of Defense.

The group, known as the Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK or MKO), "is interfering in social and political issues as if it's an Iraqi organization," Maliki told reporters at a recent press conference. "It's a terrorist organization and the presence of this group in Iraq contradicts the constitution," he said, calling for the group's eviction.

Although the Iraqi leader neglected to mention the United States, his position is at direct odds with current and former military and White House officials who view the MKO as a potential 'democratic' alternative to the present Iranian regime.

Furthermore, the Iraqi Prime Minister's stance could jeopardize a covert operations program reportedly being directed by the Department of Defense against Tehran. The Pentagon is reportedly running the MKO in Iran's oil-rich province of Khuzestan -- which has been the subject of numerous attacks and terrorist bombings over the past year -- and in the opium-smuggling border province of Sistan-Baluchistan, where suspected US/MKO operatives attacked and killed several Iranian officials just this March.

The prime minister's recent comments on the MKO were reiterated by Iraq's Deputy Interior Minister for Security Affairs, Salam al-Zawba'i, who announced a "comprehensive plan, which requires approval of the government to expel the MKO from the country by the year's end."

The Iraqi official also said that the MKO "seeks to hatch plots against the Iraqi nation." Although he did not cite any specific examples, there are many in Iraq, including parliamentary leaders, that have accused the US of sponsoring MKO terrorist bombings -- not just in Iran -- but in Iraq as well.

more at Op-Ed News

By R. Jeffrey Smith
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 9, 2006; Page A01

The Bush administration has drafted amendments to a war crimes law that would eliminate the risk of prosecution for political appointees, CIA officers and former military personnel for humiliating or degrading war prisoners, according to U.S. officials and a copy of the amendments.

Officials say the amendments would alter a U.S. law passed in the mid-1990s that criminalized violations of the Geneva Conventions, a set of international treaties governing military conduct in wartime. The conventions generally bar the cruel, humiliating and degrading treatment of wartime prisoners without spelling out what all those terms mean.

The draft U.S. amendments to the War Crimes Act would narrow the scope of potential criminal prosecutions to 10 specific categories of illegal acts against detainees during a war, including torture, murder, rape and hostage-taking.

Left off the list would be what the Geneva Conventions refer to as "outrages upon [the] personal dignity" of a prisoner and deliberately humiliating acts -- such as the forced nakedness, use of dog leashes and wearing of women's underwear seen at the U.S.-run Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq -- that fall short of torture.

"People have gotten worried, thinking that it's quite likely they might be under a microscope," said a U.S. official. Foreigners are using accusations of unlawful U.S. behavior as a way to rein in American power, the official said, and the amendments are partly meant to fend this off.

The plan has provoked concern at the International Committee of the Red Cross, the entity responsible for safeguarding the Geneva Conventions. A U.S official confirmed that the group's lawyers visited the Pentagon and the State Department last week to discuss the issue but left without any expectation that their objections would be heeded.

(...)

No criminal prosecutions have been brought under the War Crimes Act, which Congress passed in 1996 and expanded in 1997. But 10 experts on the laws of war, who reviewed a draft of the amendments at the request of The Washington Post, said the changes could affect how those involved in detainee matters act and how other nations view Washington's respect for its treaty obligations.

"This removal of [any] reference to humiliating and degrading treatment will be perceived by experts and probably allies as 'rewriting' " the Geneva Conventions, said retired Army Lt. Col. Geoffrey S. Corn, who was recently chief of the war law branch of the Army's Office of the Judge Advocate General. Others said the changes could affect how foreigners treat U.S. soldiers.

The amendments would narrow the reach of the War Crimes Act, which now states in general terms that Americans can be prosecuted in federal criminal courts for violations of "Common Article 3" of the Geneva Conventions, which the United States ratified in 1949.

(...)

If the underlying treaty provision is too vague, asked Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), then how could the Defense Department instruct its personnel in a July 7 memorandum to certify their compliance with it? Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England, who had signed the memo, responded at the hearing that he was concerned that "degrading" and "humiliating" are relative terms.

"I mean, what is degrading in one society may not be degrading in another, or may be degrading in one religion, not in another religion," England said. "And since it does have an international interpretation, which is generally, frankly, different than our own, it becomes very, very relevant" to define the meaning in new legislation.

This viewpoint appears to have won over the top uniformed military lawyers, who have criticized other aspects of the administration's detainee policy but said that they support the thrust of these amendments. Maj. Gen. Scott C. Black, the Army's judge advocate general, said in testimony that the changes can "elevate" the War Crimes Act "from an aspiration to an instrument" by defining offenses that can be prosecuted instead of endorsing "the ideals of the laws of war."

Lawyer David Rivkin, formerly on the staff of the Justice Department and the White House counsel's office, said "it's not a question of being stingy but coming up with a well-defined statutory scheme that would withstand constitutional challenges and would lead to successful prosecutions." Former Justice Department lawyer John C. Yoo similarly said that U.S. soldiers and agents should "not be beholden to the definition of vague words by international or foreign courts, who often pursue nakedly political agendas at odds with the United States."

But Corn, the Army's former legal expert, said that Common Article 3 was, according to its written history, "left deliberately vague because efforts to define it would invariably lead to wrongdoers identifying 'exceptions,' and because the meaning was plain -- treat people like humans and not animals or objects." Eugene R. Fidell, president of the nonprofit National Institute of Military Justice, said that laws governing military conduct are filled with broadly described prohibitions that are nonetheless enforceable, including "dereliction of duty," "maltreatment" and "conduct unbecoming an officer."

Retired Rear Adm. John D. Hutson, the Navy's top uniformed lawyer from 1997 to 2000 and now dean of the Franklin Pierce Law Center, said his view is "don't trust the motives of any lawyer who changes a statutory provision that is short, clear, and to the point and replaces it with something that is much longer, more complicated, and includes exceptions within exceptions."

Link

Iraqi minister's guards 'arrested by American forces'
By Qais Al-Bashir, Associated Press Writer
Published: 14 August 2006

Iraq's health minister, who is aligned to a major Shiite militia, claimed Sunday that US forces arrested seven of his personal guards in a surprise pre-dawn raid on his office. The reason for the alleged arrests was unclear.

Health minister Ali al-Shemari said the soldiers arrived at 3 a.m. yesterday, broke open doors inside the building leading to his office and hauled away the seven men, who were posted there as night guards.

There was no US statement on he claim. However, a US official, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case, said Iraqi forces with US advisers searched the ministry after a tip from an Iraqi citizen and took five people into custody for further questioning.

"There was no legal warrant, there was no prior warning to the ministry, there was no reason to arrest them. It is a provocation," said al-Shemari, a Shiite aligned to the anti-US radical cleric, Muqtada al-Sadr, who heads Iraq's biggest Shiite militia, the Mahdi Army.

"We demand that the government and the prime minister put an end to the American military operations," he told The Associated Press.

He said it appeared the seven men were arrested on false accusations made by unknown people. He did not elaborate.

The health minister was involved in a controversy when a senior health official from Diyala province, a Sunni, disappeared along with his secretary and two guards soon after a meeting with the minister in his office on June 12.

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Insurgent Bombs Directed at G.I.’s Increase in Iraq

This New York Times article is by Michael R. Gordon, Mark Mazzetti and Thom Shanker.

WASHINGTON, Aug. 16 — The number of roadside bombs planted in Iraq rose in July to the highest monthly total of the war, offering more evidence that the anti-American insurgency has continued to strengthen despite the killing of the terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

Along with a sharp increase in sectarian attacks, the number of daily strikes against American and Iraqi security forces has doubled since January. The deadliest means of attack, roadside bombs, made up much of that increase. In July, of 2,625 explosive devices, 1,666 exploded and 959 were discovered before they went off. In January, 1,454 bombs exploded or were found.

The bomb statistics — compiled by American military authorities in Baghdad and made available at the request of The New York Times — are part of a growing body of data and intelligence analysis about the violence in Iraq that has produced somber public assessments from military commanders, administration officials and lawmakers on Capitol Hill.

“The insurgency has gotten worse by almost all measures, with insurgent attacks at historically high levels,” said a senior Defense Department official who agreed to discuss the issue only on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak for attribution. “The insurgency has more public support and is demonstrably more capable in numbers of people active and in its ability to direct violence than at any point in time.”

A separate, classified report by the Defense Intelligence Agency, dated Aug. 3, details worsening security conditions inside the country and describes how Iraq risks sliding toward civil war, according to several officials who have read the document or who have received a briefing on its contents.

[...]

Yet some outside experts who have recently visited the White House said Bush administration officials were beginning to plan for the possibility that Iraq’s democratically elected government might not survive.

“Senior administration officials have acknowledged to me that they are considering alternatives other than democracy,” said one military affairs expert who received an Iraq briefing at the White House last month and agreed to speak only on condition of anonymity.

“Everybody in the administration is being quite circumspect,” the expert said, “but you can sense their own concern that this is drifting away from democracy.”

Strife Moving Out From Baghdad to Villages
Shiites, Sunnis Vie for Control of Diyala Province

By Ann Scott Tyson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 16, 2006; Page A08

KHAN BANI SAD, Iraq -- Telba Khalif was in the vineyard when the mortar shell crashed down, sending her running terrified toward her house. Day and night, similar explosions had rocked her village -- on the road, by the canal, in the fields -- in what U.S. and Iraqi military officials call a bleeding of sectarian strife out from Baghdad.

"We can't sleep every night because this is happening," Khalif said in her stucco home, surrounded by other veiled women and girls. "We're very scared."

Mortar attacks that erupted last month between Sunni and Shiite villages around Khan Bani Sad are part of a complex power struggle in the demographically mixed province of Diyala, a contested area stretching from Baghdad to Iran. Sunni fighters are trying to push Shiite families out of the region, while Shiite militiamen from Baghdad are moving in aggressively to attack Sunnis and expand their turf, the officials say.

U.S. commanders had planned on withdrawing hundreds of American troops from this province, but instead this month they ordered an increase in troop levels to help stem the spread of sectarian violence. The Iraqi army has grown more capable in Diyala, and took over a large portion of the province last month. But the decision to add American troops underscored the limitations of their Iraqi counterparts, particularly the police, who must overcome mistrust fostered by the sectarian tensions.

"Our mission is not to let them fail catastrophically," one U.S. officer, speaking on condition of anonymity, said of the Iraqi troops.

[...]

Searching a farm, Mohammed ali Ahmed, a 26-year-old Shiite soldier, shook his head. "In this area, all the Sunnis are killing Shiites," he said, dragging a finger across his throat. "The Sunnis are upset and want to destroy the new government. God willing, we will get control and civil war won't happen."