AP: 1,361 Iraqis killed in April

[nostamj]

while the US deaths are unbearable, the Iraqis are dying at a 10 to 1 ratio.... ALL of the blood is on Bush's hands.


April 30, 2004  |  BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- Volunteers hunting for bodies in Fallujah find a woman and her daughter in their home, killed in the siege but undiscovered for days. Chanting mourners bury two boys caught in the crossfire of a Baghdad gunfight. A morgue in Basra overflows with torn and burned bodies from a suicide bombing.

Victims – young and old, women and men, insurgents and innocents – have been piling up day by day, making April the deadliest month for Iraqis – and Americans – since the fall of Saddam Hussein a year ago.

Official and complete death counts for Iraqis nationwide are unavailable. But a count by The Associated Press found that around 1,361 Iraqis were killed from April 1 to April 30 – 10 times the figure of at least 136 U.S. troops who died during the same period.

The carnage in Fallujah, where U.S. Marines battled to uproot Sunni insurgents from their greatest stronghold, traumatized an entire city. Residents blame many of the deaths on Marine snipers or bombings by warplanes, including fearsome AC-130 gunships and F-18s dropping 500-pound bombs.

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During the height of the siege, residents were unable to get outside, so an unknown number of dead were buried in backyards.

http://www.salon.com/news/wire/2004/04/30/iraqidead/index.html