DW: UN says almost 1,000 killed in Iraq violence in December
The United Nations has said that violence in Iraq had claimed the lives of 980 Iraqis in total in December 2015. The number was up from 888 in November.
The UN Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI), announced that 506 of the 980 people killed in December were civilians, while the remaining were security forces, including Kurdish peshmerga and paramilitary troops fighting against the self-declared "Islamic State" (IS) in parts of Iraq.
The worst-affected province mentioned in the report was Baghdad with 261 people killed, followed by Ninevah province in the northwest of the country with 68 dead. Ninevah's provincial capital Mosul has been under IS control for 18 months, while the majority of the province still remains under government control.
The War Against The Islamic State In Iraq -- News Updates January 1, 2016
UN says 980 people killed in Iraq violence in December, toll up from previous month -- AP
UN: Hundreds of Iraqis killed in December, mostly in Baghdad -- RUDAW
Over 22,000 Iraqis Killed, Injured in 2015 in Acts of Violence -- Sputnik
Coalition Conducts 24 Strikes Against ISIL in Iraq -- US Department of Defense
U.S. reports 24 air strikes against Islamic State in Iraq -- Reuters
Iraq forces extend Ramadi control, rescue civilians -- AFP
Iraq conflict: Damage to Ramadi hampers return of displaced people -- BBC
Mass grave of Iraqi security forces discovered near Mosul -- Rudaw
Iraq: Turkey not respecting deal on retreating troops -- Al Arabiya
Sparring Continues Over Turkish Troops in Northern Iraq -- VOA
U.N. warns that millions of children from war-torn Iraq could be ‘lost’ -- JNS
Iraq Says It Exported More Than 1 Billion Barrels of Oil in 2015 -- Bloomberg
After Ramadi, bigger fights to come in Iraq against ISIS -- PBS News Hour
Iraq’s army faces tough challenge to build on victory -- Geoff Dyer, Financial Times
What the liberation of Ramadi means for Iraq, Iran, and the U.S. -- Kenneth Pollack, Brookings
Victory in Ramadi may not yet not be proof of strategy, but it is a milestone -- Karen De Young, Washington Post
6 comments:
The UN never kept track of civilian deaths during the US Operation Iraqi Freedom. Lieutenant General Tommy Franks, who led the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan during his time as head of US Central Command, once announced, "We don't do body counts." But now the UN does, because the US isn't responsible for any of them, and they can be used (it's thought) to advance US objectives.
Al Masdar (yeah I know what kind of news site it is) came up with a news about the IS counterattack made on and around Ramadi, and it' aint looks good. For me the more important part was a video embeded to the article, of an unlisted youtube video, which claims to be made by IS fighters. I checked the video, got to locate some position in it, and it's really Ramadi, not much north from the gov. buildings and because the fighters in the video shooting units with Iraqian flags, it's not need to caluclate much to figure out they are IS fighters. I did not heard about this from other news, so I thought worth to mention.
mlacix,
I've been checking in and around, but not paying that much attention. You think they might have something going on or is it just jumpy reporters?
James
It's a stange case. The recent reports were very negative, but not confirmed, however Iraqian Army admitted some territorial losses. About the video, I'm not impressed by the local IS forces, neighter their equipments nor organisation level not seems to be anything above avarange rebels. In the video, which was uploaded today, and had to be recorded in the past 2-3 days, they were about half a kilometer NE from the main junction at the gov. buildings. Seems like the Iraqian offensive draw a line alongside the 11. main route/road and captured the southern areas mostly. Unfortunatly we do not get updates from the actual stance of the frontline, so hard to tell more. If the rumors are true that Huz district has been lost, the whole Iraqian offensive goes back to where it started.
I do not fear about any IS reinforcments arriving to the city itself, but the IS forces whos already stationed there could do a push, and everything will depend how the militias and the army to hold the line (because the Golden Division or any other better trained forces could not cover so many areas) and we know thats way too much risk. IS counterattach seems to cover different, distance targets to divert the defending forces, and to weaken the downtown frontline. I have something else in my mind about this counterattack, but I do not even dare to write it down, and only could hope it's never been in the mind of IS forces, because if yes, shit will go down.
Anyway, so far we only have one source about this story, so very hard to tell anything. But if the source is true, than some bad news gonna come.
mlacix,
Thanks. I personally (it's a guess, no real evidence) think we're on the verge of a major IS push in Iraq. I think the Iranis are also worried about the same thing (re: recent reallocation of Irani forces from Syria to Iraq). The Iraqi Ramadi operation was heavily weighted toward political goals and it's going to come back to bite the Iraqis and by extension the US. The world screwed around for a year and missed it's chance to deal with these guys fairly easily. Now they've learned a lot and it's showing even up to the operational level. Well that's enough blabbing from me, keep me posted.
"The world screwed around for a year and missed it's chance to deal with these guys fairly easily. "
There was no "screwing around", the rise of ISIS was politically useful.
"The reason, the president added, “that we did not just start taking a bunch of airstrikes all across Iraq as soon as ISIL came in was because that would have taken the pressure off of [Prime Minister Nuri Kamal] al-Maliki.”
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/08/09/opinion/president-obama-thomas-l-friedman-iraq-and-world-affairs.html?referer=
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