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Al Jazeera (English)
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Iraqi Civilian Deaths ... caused by Bush's unprovoked war

 

Rights group says U.S. troops used excessive force in April shootings that killed 20 Iraqis
(Jim Krane, Associated Press, 6/18/2003)
U.S. soldiers used excessive force when they shot and killed 20 protesters and wounded almost 90 others in the restive city of Fallujah, according to a report by a human rights group that calls for a U.S. investigation into the two April shootings. . . . The group, Human Rights Watch, said it found no concrete evidence to support U.S. assertions that troops returned precision fire on gunmen in the crowd who shot first. . . . Human Rights Watch investigators who examined the sites of the shootings said they did not find conclusive evidence of bullet damage on buildings used as a base by U.S. troops. Despite detailed claims of shooting, there was little to suggest U.S. troops had been fired upon, according to the report, issued Tuesday. . . . The evidence suggested soldiers of the Army's 82nd Airborne Division's 2nd Brigade responded to a perceived threat with disproportionate force, according to the report. . . . Since the April shootings, Fallujah, about 35 miles west of Baghdad, has become synonymous with resistance to the U.S.-led occupation of Iraq. Subsequent ambushes of troops have killed four U.S. soldiers and wounded 21. . . . Human Rights Watch said the original order to police Fallujah with combat troops of the 82nd, a paratrooper unit whose soldiers had come straight from battle, was a ''recipe for disaster.'' . . . The troops were unprepared and ill-equipped for the post-conflict job of dealing with hostile civilian crowds. They lacked translators, law enforcement training and non-lethal crowd control tools, the report states. . . . Protesters said they were attacked without provocation by U.S. troops who fired automatic weapons for 10 minutes. . . . Iraqi witnesses denied shots had been fired at U.S. troops but said some protesters threw rocks at the soldiers and their vehicles.

[Comment: Sounds like stories coming from the West Bank ... children throw stones, and soldiers murder them with automatic weapons. Before this is over, America is going to think their war in Viet Nam was kind and gentle.]

posted by Lorenzo 3:58 PM