With over 7,000 civilian casualties so far, 2013 has already become the deadliest year in Iraq since 2008. In its new project, a timeline of the violence, RT brings the sad record into the spotlight.

     Following the withdrawal of US troops in December 2011, instead  of engaging in post-war and occupation recovery, Iraq has been  with each day plunging deeper into inter-ethnic violence,  prompted by ever-growing tensions mostly between the country’s  majority Shiite community and the Sunni minority.
2013 saw the situation aggravate to its worst, with almost daily  deaths of civilians becoming the harsh reality the country is  facing today.
“You, I and anyone who walks in the streets, at any moment may  face a car bomb, motorcycle bomb, or explosive belt. At any  moment anyone may be killed,” a Baghdad resident sums it up  speaking to RT’s Egor Piskunov.
“It’s 10 or 11 years now that they’re talking about a new  security plan, but nothing changes and the situation is only  getting worse,” another Iraqi adds.

 

Iraqi civilians check the site of an explosion in Baghdad on August 28, 2013. (AFP Photo / Ali Al-Saadi)

So often are all kinds of attacks in Iraq that not all of them  eventually make it into the headlines, in a situation when a  peaceful day in Baghdad would be more likely perceived as news.
One notable example this year was on April 15, when the entire  world was glued to the screens watching the overwhelming coverage  of the Boston Marathon Bombings in which three people died and an  estimated 264 injured. That same day Iraq was rocked by a series  of bombings which killed 55 and left 300 people injured.
The much deadlier ‘black Monday’ in Iraq went virtually unnoticed by  global news outlets compared to the Boston events.
“Because it is just accepted as normal for Iraq. That’s what  Iraqis do. Endure this new form of freedom,” Hamit Dardagan,  co-founder of Iraq Body Count, explained the paradox in an  interview to RT’s Laura Smith.

 

An Iraqi boy cries at the scene of a car bomb attack after it exploded as worshippers left a Sunni mosque after prayers marking the start of the Eid al-Adha Muslim holiday in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk on October 15, 2013. (AFP Photo / Marwan Ibrahim)

Iraq Body Count, founded by volunteers from the UK and the US in  2003, keeps a record of civilian casualties doing the job  government officials are reluctant to fulfill, saying is too  difficult. The group’s online database of civilian deaths is  considered one of the most reliable.
“The information we get is mostly from the sort of small news  wire type reports and Iraqi media reports that don’t really make  the news an ordinary news consumer would see,” Dardagan tells  RT. “In other words it takes a research effort to pull  together these small reports that come from different parts of  the country and that list what you would think of small events of  someone being assassinated or blown up in their car.”
Violence escalated in Iraq this year following a deadly security   crackdown on a Sunni protest camp in April.  In  September – the deadliest on record so far this year – 1,220  people have died, and the trend continues.
In the latest outbreak of violence, a series of attacks killed at  least 30 people across the country on Thursday, according to  officials.
The deadliest resulted from two suicide bombers who rammed their  explosive-packed cars into a military base in the town of  Tarmiyah, killing at least 19 soldiers and wounding 41,  authorities said.
Another bomb killed four people and wounded six when pilgrims en  route to Karbala stopped at a food tent.
Prior to that a suicide bomber attacked an army post in the town  of Ana, killing three soldiers and wounding six, while another  explosion killed two persons in a town just south of Baghdad.
Two more people were killed in the city of Mosul, where police  said eight more were wounded.

 

Iraqis gather around burnt vehicles at the site of a car bombing at a market in Baghdad’s impoverished district of Sadr City on May 16, 2013 as at least eight people were killed in blasts across the country. (AFP Photo / Ahmad Al-Rubaye)

The American author of ‘Blood on Our Hands: The American Invasion  and Destruction of Iraq’, Nicolas J.S. Davies, believes the  US-led operation had simply devastated the nation.

“The invasion was not just some kind of mistake. The invasion  and occupation were a serious crime,” Davies told RT.   “That was a crime of aggression under the UN charter. Iraq is  still suffering from the destruction of its regime, its  government and its society by the United States. The US employed  classic divide and rule strategy pitting people of different  sects against each other, inciting violence that is completely  unprecedented in that country and now has instilled a sectarian  based government. And this is just a reign of terror. And in that  sense some of the worst aspects of the US occupation are still  continuing today.”

Violence between Shia and Sunni is resulting in a humanitarian  crisis. The United Nations estimates that the conflict led to 1.1  million of Iraqis becoming internally displaced persons (IDPs) in  the country, which has witnessed more than 115,000 deaths in 10  years.
The Iraqi Prime Minister, Nouri Maliki, spoke late October of how  drastic the situation in the country has become.
“It has become clear… Iraq has become subjected to a war of  genocide by terrorists, targeting all spheres of life,”   Maliki said.           Last week, he met with President Obama. The two leaders agreed  Iraq was in urgent need of help. But besides general statements  nothing definite came out – such as how to save people’s lives on  the ground

Related articles

• Attacks on Iraq army base kill 16 (bbc.co.uk)
• Urgent – 13 Persons killed, wounded in Baghdad [11/07/2013] (iraqinews.com)
• UN says nearly 1,000 Iraqis killed in October (dailystar.com.lb)