Austin-American Statesman : U.S., Iraq differ on toll after Sadr City raid

Monday, October 22, 2007

U.S., Iraq differ on toll after Sadr City raid

Military says 49 combatants were killed; Iraq puts number at 15 and says all were civilians

By Christian Berthelsen | LOS ANGELES TIMES | October 22, 2007

BAGHDAD, Iraq — U.S. forces engaged in an hours-long gunbattle with militants during an early morning raid in the Shiite Muslim district of Sadr City on Sunday, killing as many as 49 people in what would be one of the highest tolls for a single operation since President Bush declared an end to active combat in 2003.

Iraqi police and hospital officials reported only 15 deaths, including three children. Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said that all the dead were civilians.

The U.S. military said that all of those killed were "criminals." Officials did not explain how they arrived at the casualty figures or explain the discrepancy between their total and that of the Iraqi government.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki issued a statement demanding that the United States not use such overwhelming force in pursuing targets and that it should further coordinate its efforts with Iraqi government forces. He said the Iraqi government would conduct an investigation.

A freelance correspondent for the Los Angeles Times said he saw the corpses of a woman and two small children.

Among the wounded were an 8-year-old and an 11-year-old boy, who were interviewed in their beds at Imam Ali hospital by the Times. Another man said his 1½-year old son was killed, as well as a neighbor's son the same age.

U.S. officials said the raid did not capture or kill its target, identified as the leader of a kidnapping cell that is part of a Shiite militant movement called the Special Groups. It is a splinter group of the Mahdi Army no longer following orders from radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, who has ordered gunmen loyal to him to put down their arms.

The Special Groups are thought by American officials to be trained, funded and supplied by Iran through its Revolutionary Guard forces.

The White House declined to comment on the clash.

Sunday's fighting follows incidents in recent weeks in which U.S. forces killed 15 civilians in an attack on alleged leaders of al Qaeda in Iraq, and Western private security contractors shot and killed unarmed Iraqi civilians, inflaming anti-U.S. sentiment.

In Parliament on Sunday, Iraqi officials discussed the possibility of placing restrictions on U.S. military operations in Iraq when it negotiates the terms of the U.N. resolution that authorizes the U.S. presence here. The resolution comes up for its annual reauthorization before year's end.

In the Sadr City raid, U.S. troops returned fire while under attack from automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenades from nearby buildings as they began raiding structures in the district, according to a military statement.

They also called in helicopter airstrikes. As U.S. soldiers left the zone, troops were hit by a roadside bomb and continued heavy fire.

The military said it was "unaware of any innocent civilians being killed as a result of this operation."

Iraqi witnesses told a largely similar version in which combatants in the neighborhood began firing on the U.S. troops, but details differed widely from the American accounts about who was injured and killed.

Additional material from The Associated Press.