IRAQ: Controversy over the US-led Falluja offensive has been increased by video footage showing a US Marine shooting dead a wounded and unarmed Iraqi in a mosque in the city on Saturday. The US military said it was investigating the killing.
The Iraqi was one of five wounded left in the mosque after Marines fought their way through the area on Friday and Saturday.
A pool report by NBC correspondent Kevin Sites said the mosque had been used by insurgents to attack US forces, who stormed it, killing 10 militants and wounding the five.
A second group of Marines entered the mosque on Saturday after reports that insurgents had moved back into it. Footage from the television crew showed the five still in the mosque. Several appeared to be already close to death, Mr Sites said.
He said a Marine noticed one prisoner was still breathing. A Marine can be heard saying on the pool footage provided to Reuters Television: "He's f***ing faking he's dead." "The Marine then raises his rifle and fires into the man's head," Sites said.
Amnesty International said that both sides in the Falluja fighting had broken the rules of war governing the protection of civilians and wounded combatants.
A senior UN human rights official, Ms Louise Arbour, called yesterday for an investigation of alleged abuses in Falluja such as disproportionate use of force and the targeting of civilians.
Iraq's government has dismissed reports that civilians in Falluja are desperately short of supplies and lack adequate medical care. Most civilians were reported to have fled the city of 300,000 ahead of the start of the offensive a week ago.
"The Iraqi government strongly rejects suggestions from some sources that there are shortages of supplies in Falluja," a statement from the office of the Prime Minister, Mr Iyad Allawi, said.
Meanwhile US and Iraqi forces have launched an offensive in Mosul to retake control of rebel-held areas after a week of anarchy that has seen insurgents attacking across Iraq's third-largest city.
"Offensive operations have begun on the western side of the river to clear out final pockets of insurgent fighting," said Capt Angela Bowman, spokeswoman for US forces in the north. "It's a significant operation to secure police stations in the area and make sure they can be put to use again."
While US forces have focused large numbers on the offensive in Falluja for the past eight days, insurgents have struck in Mosul and elsewhere in Sunni Muslim areas north of Baghdad.
US and Iraqi forces met little resistance in the early stages of the Mosul operation but said a 4 p.m. to 6 a.m. curfew would remain in place and that the five bridges over the Tigris in the city were closed, Capt Bowman said.
- (Reuters)