Justin Time
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Raped Iraqi woman feared US troops: report
Mon Jul 3, 2006 7:06am ET17
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A woman apparently at the center of a rape-murder probe by the U.S. military in Iraq was only 15 and voiced fears about soldiers' advances before she and her family were killed in March, the Washington Post said on Monday.
Quoting the mayor of Mahmudiya, near Baghdad, an unnamed hospital official and neighbors of the alleged victims, the newspaper named the woman, her parents and 7-year-old sister as having been killed in their home in the town on March 11.
The paper did not affirm the woman, Abeer Qasim Hamza, was killed by Americans, but local people quoted appeared to believe the dead family was the one involved in the U.S. investigation.
A U.S. military official in Baghdad told Reuters details of the incident they described were at odds with U.S. documents in the 10-day-old investigation of at least three soldiers. U.S. officials had the rape victim's age as 20, he said. However, he added, he was not aware of any other such cases in the area.
The U.S. military has given few details publicly. Officials say at least three soldiers are under investigation over the alleged rape of a woman and the killing of three relatives, including a child, in their home at Mahmudiya on March 12.
Two are suspected of rape and one of these, since discharged from the army, is also suspected of murder, officials said.
The Washington Post quoted Omar Janabi, who said he was a neighbor, saying Abeer Qasim's mother had told him on March 10 that the young woman had complained repeatedly about advances made toward her by U.S. soldiers at a nearby checkpoint.
Janabi told the newspaper he was one of the first people to arrive at the family house after the attack. He said he found Abeer sprawled dead in a corner, her hair and a pillow next to her consumed by fire, and her dress pushed up to her neck.
DEATH CERTIFICATES
The paper said death certificates from Mahmudiya hospital identified the victims as Abeer Qasim Hamza, 15, shot in the head and burned; her mother Fakhriyah Taha Muhsin, 34, killed by gunshots to her head; her father Qasim Hamza Raheem, 45, whose head was "smashed" by bullets; and Hadeel Qasim Hamza, 7.
The inquiry was launched after two soldiers from the 502nd Infantry Regiment came forward last month to make allegations about comrades. The killings had previously been recorded by the military as the work of guerrillas, U.S. officers say.
Local residents and officials in the area, one of the most dangerous and violent in Iraq, have offered Reuters reporters conflicting accounts of incidents involving U.S. troops.
Two years after the scandal over U.S. prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib jail and coming after a string of murder charges against U.S. troops and accusations over the killing of 24 people in the western city of Haditha, the rape allegation is potentially incendiary in Iraq's conservative Muslim society.
Iraq's main organization of Sunni Muslim clerics, long hostile to the U.S. occupation, said on Sunday the Mahmudiya case revealed "the real, ugly face of America".
In recent months, officials say, commanders have cracked down on rogue soldiers in a bid to gain the trust of ordinary Iraqis and of their new government after three years of growing resentment that U.S. officers say risks fuelling the insurgency.
http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=newsOne&storyID=2006-07-03T112053Z_01_IBO326760_RTRUKOC_0_US-IRAQ-RAPE-REPORT.xml
Mon Jul 3, 2006 7:06am ET17
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A woman apparently at the center of a rape-murder probe by the U.S. military in Iraq was only 15 and voiced fears about soldiers' advances before she and her family were killed in March, the Washington Post said on Monday.
Quoting the mayor of Mahmudiya, near Baghdad, an unnamed hospital official and neighbors of the alleged victims, the newspaper named the woman, her parents and 7-year-old sister as having been killed in their home in the town on March 11.
The paper did not affirm the woman, Abeer Qasim Hamza, was killed by Americans, but local people quoted appeared to believe the dead family was the one involved in the U.S. investigation.
A U.S. military official in Baghdad told Reuters details of the incident they described were at odds with U.S. documents in the 10-day-old investigation of at least three soldiers. U.S. officials had the rape victim's age as 20, he said. However, he added, he was not aware of any other such cases in the area.
The U.S. military has given few details publicly. Officials say at least three soldiers are under investigation over the alleged rape of a woman and the killing of three relatives, including a child, in their home at Mahmudiya on March 12.
Two are suspected of rape and one of these, since discharged from the army, is also suspected of murder, officials said.
The Washington Post quoted Omar Janabi, who said he was a neighbor, saying Abeer Qasim's mother had told him on March 10 that the young woman had complained repeatedly about advances made toward her by U.S. soldiers at a nearby checkpoint.
Janabi told the newspaper he was one of the first people to arrive at the family house after the attack. He said he found Abeer sprawled dead in a corner, her hair and a pillow next to her consumed by fire, and her dress pushed up to her neck.
DEATH CERTIFICATES
The paper said death certificates from Mahmudiya hospital identified the victims as Abeer Qasim Hamza, 15, shot in the head and burned; her mother Fakhriyah Taha Muhsin, 34, killed by gunshots to her head; her father Qasim Hamza Raheem, 45, whose head was "smashed" by bullets; and Hadeel Qasim Hamza, 7.
The inquiry was launched after two soldiers from the 502nd Infantry Regiment came forward last month to make allegations about comrades. The killings had previously been recorded by the military as the work of guerrillas, U.S. officers say.
Local residents and officials in the area, one of the most dangerous and violent in Iraq, have offered Reuters reporters conflicting accounts of incidents involving U.S. troops.
Two years after the scandal over U.S. prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib jail and coming after a string of murder charges against U.S. troops and accusations over the killing of 24 people in the western city of Haditha, the rape allegation is potentially incendiary in Iraq's conservative Muslim society.
Iraq's main organization of Sunni Muslim clerics, long hostile to the U.S. occupation, said on Sunday the Mahmudiya case revealed "the real, ugly face of America".
In recent months, officials say, commanders have cracked down on rogue soldiers in a bid to gain the trust of ordinary Iraqis and of their new government after three years of growing resentment that U.S. officers say risks fuelling the insurgency.
http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=newsOne&storyID=2006-07-03T112053Z_01_IBO326760_RTRUKOC_0_US-IRAQ-RAPE-REPORT.xml
