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| Iraq |
| Iraqi vice president sez 100,000 have fled |
| 2006-05-01 |
| A new estimate by one of Iraq's vice presidents has put the number of people who have fled their homes at 100,000, exceeding recent projections by other Iraqi officials and further clouding the debate over how deeply sectarian conflicts are affecting the nation. The latest estimate was made by Adel Abdul Mahdi, a Shiite leader selected as one of two vice presidents, but it was not clear where he had gotten his information. On Friday he had suggested the number was 100,000 families, but today corrected it to say that 100,000 people were living as refugees. In an interview last week, the Iraqi national security adviser, Mowaffak al-Rubaie, said 13,750 families had been displaced, which could mean about 70,000 to 80,000 people. The conflicting numbers speak to the difficulty in estimating how many people are fleeing the violence, when most are believed to be finding shelter with relatives or friends. And both estimates contrast with statements by American military leaders, who have said there is no "widespread movement" of Iraqis fleeing from sectarian fighting. Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch, a senior American military spokesman in Baghdad, says reports of a huge number of displaced persons and refugees appear to be overblown. "We see reports of tens of thousands of families displaced here in Iraq, and we chase down each and every one of those reports," he said Thursday. "But we have seen some displacement, pockets of families moving, but not in large numbers." "Some of them truly are moving because they're concerned about their own personal security or their family's security, I'm sure of that," General Lynch said. "Some of them are moving for economic reasons. Some of them are moving to be with their families. But we're not seeing internally displaced persons at the rate which causes us alarm." But Iraqi officials say that people who live in areas where they are part of an ethnic or religious minority face continual threats, including in places far from Baghdad. Sheik Omar al-Jibouri, a human rights officer with the Iraqi Islamic Party, a large Sunni Arab group, said that in Zubayr, a suburb of Basra, Sunnis are being increasingly warned to leave. At least 60 Sunnis were killed there in the past month, he said. "Leaflets fill the streets saying, 'Leave this district, Wahhabis!' " Mr. Jibouri said Saturday. "Neither students nor officials can work" if they are Sunnis, because of the threats, he said. In Baghdad, 10 bodies were discovered Saturday in three neighborhoods, all shot in the head with signs of torture, an Interior Ministry official said. The United States military reported that an American soldier was killed about 4 p.m. Saturday by a roadside bomb southwest of Baghdad. And the Marines reported that a car bomb in Qaim, in western Iraq, had killed three civilians. Agence France-Presse reported that at least six Iraqi security force members were killed Saturday. By itself, the terrorist group Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia says it has carried out 800 suicide attacks in Iraq in the past three years, not including attacks by "other mujahedeen," according to Ayman al-Zawahiri, the No. 2 Qaeda leader, who made the statement in a video posted on the Internet on Saturday. "This is what has broken the back of America in Iraq," Mr. Zawahiri said, according to a translation by the SITE Institute, which tracks violent insurgent groups. "America, Britain and their allies have achieved nothing but losses, disasters and misfortunes." |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |
| #9 Gateway Pundit has some links and details here, from today and here, from Saturday |
| Posted by: Adriane 2006-05-01 18:20 |
| #8 That's more-or-less what I was thinking, LH. Surely if there were a large number of refugees setting up some sort of camp, we'd have 24-hour handwringing on the teevee. |
| Posted by: Seafarious 2006-05-01 13:57 |
| #7 Sea From what ive read theyre moving internally. Shia are moving to Najaf, Sunnis are moving to Anbar. Some are just moving to different parts of Baghdad. And theyre often taken in by relatives, etc. I did see a report a few weeks ago of a camp being set up in Najaf for Shia refugees from Baghdad, but havent seen any follow up. My take is that while the numbers be exagerrated it is going on. There are clearly at least a few neighborhoods in Baghdad, and parts of the "triangle of death" just South of Baghdad, where its almost suicidal to remain if youre in the wrong sect. But you dont have to go real far to find someplace much safer. Im not sure if the numbers are as small as I think they are cause there are still safe mixed areas, or if there were never that many mixed areas in Baghdad to begine with. |
| Posted by: Liberalhawk 2006-05-01 13:00 |
| #6 "er maybe it was a million! Yeah a million ...uh families! Yeah, that's the ticket!" |
| Posted by: Frank G 2006-05-01 12:17 |
| #5 "Do you really think the NYT is misquoting Mahdi?" No. It's called "quoting for effect". |
| Posted by: Fordesque 2006-05-01 11:12 |
| #4 It's not clear where all these DPs are moving *to*. Iran or Kurdistan? We haven't had any reports of any refugee camps, have we? And if there *were* refugee camps, I would tend to regard them as terror training camps, more like Sadr City or Ein-el-Hellhole. Even if an Iraqi camp didn't start that way, that is surely how it would end up. |
| Posted by: Seafarious 2006-05-01 10:09 |
| #3 "The latest estimate was made by Adel Abdul Mahdi, a Shiite leader selected as one of two vice presidents, but it was not clear where he had gotten his information. On Friday he had suggested the number was 100,000 families, but today corrected it to say that 100,000 people were living as refugees." Do you really think the NYT is misquoting Mahdi? |
| Posted by: Liberalhawk 2006-05-01 10:02 |
| #2 yipes sorry about that last post. I was reeeally tired last night - so I'm not sure what my point was other than I get tired of reading the deeply sectarian doom gloom macros by the NYT reporters instead of real reporting. |
| Posted by: 2b 2006-05-01 07:28 |
| #1 I'm busy minding my own business, reading rantburg and then ... after one sentence, just one, I think to myself, "this has got to be NYT BS". I click the link and ... well, what do you know...NYT. I didn't even get past the first sentence and already it was clear!!! I know that for the true intel types there are treasures to be found in flea markets like this. However, as someone who no longer has the time or inclination to sift through the piles of junk like this, should anyone else find a jewel among these rags, could you pass it on for the rest of us??? Thanks. |
| Posted by: 2b 2006-05-01 02:04 |