FACTBOX-Civilian Deaths in the War in Iraq
Tue April 1, 2003 07:38 AM ET
LONDON (Reuters) - U.S. Marines shot dead an unarmed Iraqi driver at a military checkpoint in southern Iraq on Tuesday, just hours after seven women and children died in a similar incident.
The seven deaths from the incident on Monday were the first from U.S. shooting that the U.S. military has officially acknowledged, but other civilian deaths from gunfire have been reported by correspondents with U.S troops.
Here are details of some of the main known incidents of civilian deaths in the war in Iraq that began on March 20.
March 20 -- Jordanian taxi driver killed in first U.S. missile strike on Baghdad.
March 23 -- U.S.-British aircraft bomb a bus carrying Syrian workers back home from Iraq, while attacking a bridge near the Syrian border. Five people are killed and an unspecified number injured. Washington later expresses regret for the accident.
March 26 -- At least 15 people die and 30 are wounded in what Iraq describes as U.S. air strike on residential and commercial street in Baghdad's al-Shaab district. The U.S. military says that neighborhood was not targeted.
March 28 -- Iraqi officials say at least 62 people are killed and 49 wounded in an air raid on a Baghdad market in the city's impoverished al-Shula neighborhood. U.S. and Britain say civilian deaths in the March 26 and March 28 incidents may have been caused by Iraqi anti-aircraft missiles missing their targets and falling back on the city; Iraq insists Western bombing was responsible.
March 28 -- Iraq says U.S. and British bombing killed 75 civilians and wounded 290 overnight around the country.
It also said that since the war began, 116 civilians had been killed and 659 wounded in Basra province, and 230 killed with 800 wounded in Dhi Qar province, containing the city of Nassiriya.
March 29 -- Iraqi family of four is caught in crossfire between U.S. Marines and Iraqi soldiers; mother is killed and four-year-old girl is hit in the eye, stomach and shoulder.
March 31 -- Seven women and children are killed when U.S. troops open fire on a van packed with 13 women and children when it fails to stop at a checkpoint in the desert near Najaf, 160 km (100 miles) south of Baghdad. Marine Corps General Peter Pace said the soldiers who shot at the van "absolutely did the right thing," because they thought their lives were threatened.
April 1 -- U.S. marines kill an unarmed Iraqi man who drove his pickup truck at speed toward a checkpoint outside the southern town of Shatra. His passenger is badly wounded. One marine says he feared a suicide bomb.
Original URL: http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=focusIraqNews&storyID=2485551
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