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Iraq to stop counting civilial dead { December 10 2003 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-3488145,00.htmlhttp://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-3488145,00.html
AP: Iraq to Stop Counting Civilian Dead
Wednesday December 10, 2003 3:46 PM
By NIKO PRICE
Associated Press Writer
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Iraq's Health Ministry has ordered a halt to a count of civilians killed during the war and told its statistics department not to release figures compiled so far, the official who oversaw the count told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
The order was relayed by the ministry's director of planning, Dr. Nazar Shabandar, but the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority, which oversees the ministry, also wanted the counting to stop, said Dr. Nagham Mohsen, the head of the ministry's statistics department.
``We have stopped the collection of this information because our minister didn't agree with it,'' she said, adding: ``The CPA doesn't want this to be done.''
A spokesman for the CPA had no immediate response.
The U.S. and British militaries don't count civilian casualties from their wars, saying only that they try to minimize civilian deaths.
A major investigation of Iraq's wartime civilian casualties was compiled by The Associated Press, which documented the deaths of 3,240 civilians between March 20 and April 20. That investigation, conducted in May and June, surveyed about half of Iraq's hospitals, and reported that the real number of civilian deaths was sure to be much higher.
The Health Ministry's count, based on records of all hospitals, promised to be more complete.
Saddam Hussein's regime fell April 9, and President Bush declared major combat operations over on May 1.
The ministry began its survey at the end of July, when shaky nationwide communication links began to improve. It sent letters to all hospitals and clinics in Iraq, asking them to send back details of civilians killed or wounded in the war.
Many hospitals responded with statistics, Mohsen said, but last month Shabinder summoned her and told her that the minister, Dr. Khodeir Abbas, wanted the count halted. He also told her not to release the partial information she had already collected, she said.
``He told me, `You should move far away from this subject,''' Mohsen said. ``I don't know why.''
Shabandar's office said he was attending a conference in Egypt and wouldn't return for two weeks. Abbas' secretary said he, too, was out of the country and would return in late December.
The coalition spokesman said officials who direct the Health Ministry weren't immediately available for comment.
Mohsen insisted that despite communications that remain poor and incomplete record-keeping by some hospitals, the statistics she received indicated that a significant count could have been completed.
``I could do it if the CPA and our minister agree that I can,'' she said in an interview in English.
Under Saddam's government, the ministry counted 1,196 civilian deaths during the war, but was forced to stop as U.S. and British forces overran southern Iraqi cities. Over the summer, the ministry compiled more figures that had been sent in previously, reaching a total of 1,764.
But officials said those numbers account for only a small number of the hospitals in Iraq, and none provided statistics through the end of the war.
The number of U.S. soldiers killed in the war is well documented. The Pentagon says 115 American military personnel were killed in combat from the start of the war to May 1, when President Bush declared major combat over, and 195 since.
Iraq kept meticulous records of its soldiers killed in action but never released them publicly. Military doctors have said the Iraqi military kept ``perfect'' records, but burned them as the war wound down.
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