Parsing the Dead

Posted on Jan 1, 2007

Officials from Iraq’s Health, Defense and Interior ministries on Monday said 16,273 Iraqi civilians, police and soldiers died from violence in 2006. The number is higher than tabulations by the Associated Press, which put the figure at 13,738, while the U.N. has estimated casualties in the neighborhood of 36,000. Whichever number is most accurate, too many people have been killed in this war.

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AP via Yahoo!:

BAGHDAD, Iraq - As enraged crowds protested the hanging of Saddam Hussein across Iraq’s Sunni heartland Monday, government officials reported that 16,273 Iraqi civilians, soldiers and police died violent deaths in 2006, a figure larger than an independent Associated Press count for the year by more than 2,500.

The tabulation by the Iraqi ministries of Health, Defense and Interior, showed that 14,298 civilians, 1,348 police and 627 soldiers were killed in the violence that raged in the country last year.

The Associated Press accounting, gleaned from daily news reports from Baghdad, arrived at a total of 13,738 deaths. The United Nations has said as many as 100 Iraqis die violently each day, which translates into 36,500 deaths annually.

In Samarra, a mob broke the locks off a bomb-damaged Shiite shrine and marched through carrying a mock coffin and photo of the dictator.

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