HADITHA MASSACRE
05 June, 2006
In a new US massacre against Iraqi civilians, US soldiers have deliberately killed 11 Iraqi civilians, including five children and four women, last March, a video footage obtained by the BBC revealed.
Some 11 Iraqi civilians were killed in Ishaqi, about 100 kilometers north of Baghdad on March 15. The US military said at the time that four people were killed when US forces engaged in firefight after a tip-off that an Al-Qaeda element was visiting a house in Ishaqi.
US forces claimed that the building collapsed under heavy fire, killing four people - the suspected Al-Qaeda element, two women and a child. But a report filed by Iraqi police accused US troops of rounding up and deliberately shooting 11 people in the house before blowing up the building. The BBC video came as US Marines face charges of killing 24 civilian Iraqis, including women and children, in cold blood last November in the western city of Haditha in what would be the worst case of abuse by American soldiers in Iraq since the 2003 invasion.The Pentagon has decided to give ethic training to all its troops in Iraq following the Haditha massacre.
The BBC videotape showed several bodies, including those of three children, one of them covered in blood.
The US military said it was investigating the incident.
Here are some questions
1) Was Haditha massacre an act of some individuals or the general policy of US forces?
2) Do you think the US troops involved in this heinous act will be punished?
3) Will the ethic training by Pentagon help curb such kind of incidents?
4) US government has announced 1500 dollars each as compensation to the families of slain civilians. Is that enough?
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