Conflicting Reports About Ramadi Explosion
Breaking story: The BBC originally reported the deaths of at least 18 Iraqi boys who were lining up to play football today in Ramadi. However, the BBC story has apparently changed: The headline now reads "Confusion over Iraq soccer blast," and the article cites an American official who claims that U.S. troops carried out a "controlled explosion" near a football field in the volatile western city.Breaking story:
The BBC originally reported the deaths of at least 18 Iraqi boys who were lining up to play football today in Ramadi. However, the BBC story has apparently changed: The headline now reads “Confusion over Iraq soccer blast,” and the article cites an American official who claims that U.S. troops carried out a “controlled explosion” near a football field in the volatile western city.
Original post (10:35 a.m.):
A car bomb claimed the lives of 18 Iraqi boys who were lining up to play a game of football today in Ramadi, a hotbed of insurgent activity toward the west of the country, and the body count may still rise. Another 20 children were reportedly injured in the explosion, which follows Saturday’s deadly bombing by a Sunni mosque near the city.
WAIT BEFORE YOU GO...BBC:
Iraqi officials said 18 people, most of them children, had been killed in a blast near a football pitch.
Later an American spokesman told Reuters news agency that US forces had carried out a controlled explosion in Ramadi, also close to a football field.
The official said there were injuries, but no deaths. It is not clear if both reports refer to the same incident.
Iraqi police said most of the victims were aged 10 to 15 and had gathered to play football when a bomb went off.
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A U.S. drone strike and air assaults by Pakistani military forces killed 38 people this weekend in tribal areas near Pakistan's border with Afghanistan, official sources reported Sunday.
The official American reaction to the coordinated attacks in Kabul, the Afghan capital, as well as at Jalalabad airbase, and in Paktika and Logar Provinces, reveals a fundamental misunderstanding of guerrilla warfare.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai has branded the Taliban’s 18-hour siege of Kabul and places across eastern Afghanistan on Sunday an intelligence failure and called for an investigation into NATO security operations.
Pointing to "the shaky, erratic and vague standpoint of the Americans" as one key reason for their decision, Taliban leaders in Afghanistan put the kibosh on plans to meet with U.S. envoys, releasing a statement on Thursday explaining the change of plans.
Claims made by NATO that Pakistan is in cahoots with the Afghan Taliban are tantamount to "old wine in an even older bottle," according to Pakistan's Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar. However, this particular batch of wine represents thousands of mandatory conversations (read: interrogations) versus Khar's official denial.
In the deadliest day for American troops since the war in Afghanistan began almost 10 years ago, 30 Americans and seven Afghan commandos died Saturday when the Chinook helicopter they were in was shot down by the Taliban.
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