Iraq war update
The body of a top Iraqi journalist was found, along with the bodies of 13 Iraqi martial arts experts kidnapped more than a year ago. The number of US military deaths topped 3,500 and private security companies were fighting insurgents on a daily basis. Security forces were said to control only 40% of Baghdad and an estimated 1,000 Iraqi refugees were fleeing to Syria every day, “The Americans should come here and see all these poor people because that’s the result of their war,” a Syrian aide worker said.
The body of Fleh Dway Megthab, editor of Iraq’s state-owned newspaper al-Sabah, was discovered Sunday in a Baghdad forensic department morgue, a newspaper source said. Official statistics released by the Iraqi Journalists’ Syndicate place the number of victims of violence among journalists since 2003 at 250.
The skulls, bones and tattered clothing of a team of Iraqi martial arts experts have been found more than a year after they disappeared, presumed kidnapped, in an al-Qaeda stronghold west of Baghdad.At least 13 bodies were found in a ditch out in the desert about 60 miles west of Ramadi in Anbar province, one of Iraq’s most violent areas and where al-Qaeda and Sunni Arab insurgents are battling American and Iraqi forces. Plastic athletic sandals lay scattered on the ground near the bodies. All had been shot.
As of Saturday, June 16, 2007, at least 3,522 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the
Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. The figure includes seven military civilians. At least 2,885 died as a result of hostile action, according to the military’s numbers. The British military has reported 150 deaths; Italy, 33; Ukraine, 18; Poland, 20; Bulgaria, 13; Spain, 11; Denmark, seven; El Salvador, five; Slovakia, four; Latvia, three; Estonia, Netherlands, Thailand, two each; and Australia, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Romania, South Korea, one death each.
Private security companies, funded by billions of dollars in US military and State Department contracts, are fighting insurgents on a widening scale in Iraq, enduring daily attacks, returning fire, and taking hundreds of casualties that have been underreported and sometimes concealed, according to US and Iraqi officials and company representatives. While the military builds up troops in an ongoing campaign to secure Baghdad, the security companies, out of public view, are engaged in a parallel surge, boosting manpower, adding expensive armor, and stepping up evasive action as attacks increase, the officials and company representatives said. One in seven supply convoys protected by private forces has come under attack this year, according to previously unreleased statistics; one security company reported nearly 300 “hostile actions” in the first four months.
The U.S.-Iraqi effort to pacify Baghdad was entering its fifth month, with 30,000 additional U.S. troops now in place. But the city has so far seen little improvement in overall violence, and a tense political standoff was under way between the U.S.-backed government and Shiite lawmakers who suspended their participation in parliament. Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno said there was a long way to go in retaking the city from Shiite Muslim militias, Sunni Arab insurgents and al-Qaida terrorists. He said only about “40 percent is really very safe on a routine basis” — with about 30 percent lacking control and a further 30 percent suffering “a high level of violence.”
Shell-shocked Iraqis of all backgrounds pour into Syria at the rate of nearly 1,000 a day. In fact, “crisis” may not be strong enough, as the flow of Iraqis becomes a torrent. At least 1.4 million are already here, according to the United Nations, each with a story of terror and trauma and a need for services that is stretching Syrians’ patience. “What’s their future, the 2 million Iraqis here? They can’t work, they have to renew their residency cards, they live in poverty. It’s an explosive situation,” said Lourance Kamle, 32, a Syrian relief worker whose agency focuses on Iraqi refugees. “Make a war? Fine. And what comes after? The Americans should come here and see all these poor people because that’s the result of their war.” Bush administration officials have long accused Syria of not doing enough to stop al-Qaida sympathizers from slipping into Iraq, but they barely mention the far larger number of Iraqis who cross the border in the other direction. The United States remains at the bottom of the list of countries that have accepted Iraqi refugees, though the State Department has promised to admit as many as 7,000 this year.
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