Even in a country ravaged by 15 months of war, the scene was horrific: a woman's head had been placed on a box containing the ashes of her cremated body. This was her punishment for working as an interpreter for US forces in Iraq.
Another interpreter was pursued on his way from work by men spraying his car with an assault rifle. They left him for dead after his car flipped over in a ditch. Insurgents entered the home of an Iraqi National Guard battalion, tied his family up and threatened to kill them if the commander didn't quit.
In the weeks running up to the establishment of a new Iraq government, insurgents have stepped up attacks on Iraqi civilians who cooperate with and work alongside coalition forces. The message from the guerrillas is clear: anyone who helps build the new, US-supported Iraqi government faces death.
"We still believe in democracy and freedom," said Sheik Saud al-Shibley, a tribal leader and vice president of the national farmer's union, who has survived three assassination attempts. "Everybody sees us and at anytime we can get hit ... [but] I don't care about these things, I carry on with life."
While several senior Iraqi officials have been assassinated -- including two members of the former Iraqi Governing Council -- no one knows for sure how many Iraqi civilians have been killed for having contact with US forces.
On Tuesday, two women working as interpreters for an American company in Basra were ambushed and killed while driving home from work. In the last three weeks, two of the 10 farmers' union leaders have been killed and three out of a group of 24 interpreters have died at the hands of insurgents.
Every slaying takes a toll on the thousands of unarmed Iraqis who cooperate with US forces.
"Any person who goes to the Americans is considered a spy," said Sheik Wadah Maliek el-Sayed, a tribal leader who has acted as a mediator between US forces and hardline Iraqi religious leaders.
He said the purpose of the interaction determined whether a meeting with Americans is allowable.
"When we come to visit the Americans to solve some problem, people know we are speaking for them," Wadah said. "If [an Iraqi] is only helping themselves, they will be killed."
Two elected neighborhood council member have been killed in the last two months, US army officers said. Colonel Michael Formica, whose 2nd Brigade of the 1st Cavalry Division controls west Baghdad, warned members of one council to change their meeting times and locations, and to be careful when driving between work and home.
"You must change your daily routine," Formica told the council. "If you could take a few weeks off, that would be a good thing."
Many of the council members asked for special weapons permits to arm bodyguards.
The next day, Formica attended a memorial service for Maytham Taleb Hammed Habib, a former lieutenant colonel in the Iraqi army, who worked as an interpreter for a new Iraqi National Guard battalion. He had suffered under former dictator Saddam Hussein's regime and was passionate about helping build a new, democratic Iraq.
He was killed by insurgents while returning home from work. Most of the interpreters do not want to be named or interviewed for fear they may be next.
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
RSS