Public Service
"Iraq Premier Sees Families Returning to Safer Capital" by CARA BUCKLEY
BAGHDAD, Nov. 11 — The United States military said Sunday that rocket and mortar attacks in Iraq have dipped to their lowest level since February 2006, a decrease it linked to the increase in American troop levels this year.
Meanwhile, tensions remained high in Samarra, where, according to the military, the Iraqi police and coalition forces killed seven insurgents on Friday. Fighting between the Islamic Army, a local Sunni group, and Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, a home-grown group that American officials say is led by foreigners, also broke out near Samarra late Friday, a government official said, leaving 23 insurgents dead.
On Sunday, Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch, commander of the Third Infantry Division in Iraq, said the discovery of Iranian-made weapons here was increasing, Reuters reported. General Lynch said it was unclear whether the rise was because more weapons were coming into Iraq or because American troops were finding more caches.
They just said last week they were dropping?!
"A decline in Iranian weapons deliveries could be one of several factors for the decrease in both Iraqi and American deaths over the past two months."
Fucking god-damn military liars!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Private Service
"Security Guard Fires From Convoy, Killing Iraqi Driver" by JAMES GLANZ
BAGHDAD, Nov. 11 — An Iraqi taxi driver was shot and killed on Saturday by a guard with DynCorp International, a private security company hired to protect American diplomats here, when a DynCorp convoy rolled past a knot of traffic on an exit ramp in Baghdad, the Iraqi Interior Ministry said Sunday.
Three witnesses said the taxi had posed no threat to the convoy, and one of them, an Iraqi Army sergeant who inspected the car afterward, said it contained no weapons or explosive devices.
Maj. Gen. Abdul-Karim Khalaf, an Interior Ministry spokesman, in his office on Sunday afternoon:
“They just killed a man and drove away. We have opened an investigation, and we have contacted the company and told them about our accusations, and we are still waiting for their response.”
It was the latest in what the Iraqi government has said are unprovoked shootings on the streets of Baghdad by security companies hired by the State Department or contractors affiliated with it.
As in several previous shootings involving security companies affiliated with the State Department, witnesses to Saturday’s shooting said they saw no reason for the guards to open fire on the car, a white Hyundai with a taxi sign on the roof, driven by Mohamad Khalil Khudair, 40. It was unclear where the convoy was headed, or whether it carried any American officials.
Raafat Jassim, 36, a witness who said he was standing outside a barbershop near the exit ramp at the time:
“The poor cabdriver was stopped here. He had his hazard lights flashing, and the convoy was a long way away from him.”
Mr. Jassim said, pointing to a spot about 50 yards down the ramp, which comes off a bridge over the Tigris River in a neighborhood called Utafiya.
Both the State Department and DynCorp confirmed that there had been a shooting involving one of the company’s convoys on Saturday. Possibly because the convoy sped away after the shooting, neither the company nor the State Department could immediately confirm that Mr. Khudair had been killed.
Possibly because? Possibly?
One witness, Sgt. Ahmad Hussein, 32, who was stationed near the spot where the shooting took place, said the convoy consisted of six vehicles, including three white trucks or sport utility vehicles with tinted glass, and three sedans, which he believed were Peugeots.
Sergeant Hussein said the convoy came barreling down the exit ramp from the bridge around midday:
“We saw them coming, so we ordered the traffic to stop.”
The crowded traffic on the ramp came to a stop, but as Mr. Khudair tried to pull closer to the side of the road, a gun in the rear truck of the convoy fired several shots into his car, Sergeant Hussein said. At least one bullet went through the windshield and struck Mr. Khudair on the right side of his chest, the sergeant said.
Another witness, who gave his name only as Ahmad, said that as the convoy sped away, he and several other people rushed to the car and found Mr. Khudair with his chest smeared in blood.
Ahmad added that Mr. Khudair’s gearshift was in neutral when they pulled him out:
“We got him out of the car and put him in another car to take him to a hospital.”
Sergeant Hussein said that Mr. Khudair was alive when he began the journey to the hospital but that he died along the way:
“He didn’t make it to the hospital.”
Two witnesses said that while Westerners appeared to be wielding the guns in the white trucks, at least some of the passengers in the sedans appeared to be Iraqis.
So what? The Iraqis didn't fire or anything!
According to DynCorp’s own report to the State Department on the episode, the DynCorp guards first used “nonlethal means to warn the driver of the vehicle to stop.” In Iraq, the term “nonlethal means” often indicates that guards threw water bottles, waved or fired a small flare to get the attention of a driver.
If the means were "non-lethal," assholes, why is the guy DEAD!??
But DynCorp told the State Department that the vehicle continued forward, and that a guard “discharged his weapon to disable the vehicle. There are conflicting accounts as to whether anyone was injured or killed."
Conflicting accounts? WTF?!
That means the U.S. is LYING AGAIN!!!
