Iraq Death Toll Reaches New High

The death toll in Iraq continues to rise at an alarming rate as hundreds of thousands flee to safety in neighbouring countries, a UN report revealed on Wednesday:

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqi deaths hit a new high in October and 100,000 people are fleeing abroad every month to escape worsening violence that is segregating the country on sectarian lines, a U.N. report said on Wednesday.

Painting a grim picture of a population caught in the cross-fire between insurgents, militias, criminal gangs and security forces, the bimonthly report put civilian deaths in October at 3,709 -- 120 a day and up from 3,345 in September.

Under growing pressure from an impatient Bush administration to do more to curb the violence, the Iraqi government accused the United Nations of exaggerating the death toll to "mislead the world". U.N. officials said they stood by their figures.

The Health Minister asserts that the death toll is only 1/4 of the UN number. al-Maliki actually banned the ministry from releasing any figures last month so, while it disputes the UN toll, it hasn't offered any real, documented figures of its own.

A month ago, it [the UN] said Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's office had banned the Health Ministry and morgue from giving it data, saying this would be controlled by the premier's office.

An official in the Maliki's media office declined to give any figures on Wednesday and referred inquiries to Shimeri.

The minister is a supporter of cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, whose Mehdi Army militia is blamed by Sunnis for death squad violence. It is a charge Sadr, a key ally of Maliki, insistently denies.

Shimeri's apparent estimate of less than 1,000 violent deaths in October is at odds with a figure given to Reuters by a source at the morgue, who said last week it alone received about 1,600 bodies in October, about 1,350 of whom died violently.

Playing politics with the number of people who have died in Iraq in order to claim that the situation is not as bad as it seems, despite daily reports like this which revealed that 101 Iraqis died today, is certainly not conducive to coming up with any kind of coherent strategy to end the violence.

Iraqis and the rest of the world have the right to know how many have perished as a result of this illegal war and despite the Iraqi and US governments efforts to hide the truth, some day we will know. You can't hide that truth forever. The people who have died have family and friends whose grief cannot be ignored and who deserve to have the fate of their loved ones acknowledged. It's cruel that the death of every single coalition soldier is noted and recorded while Iraqis who suffer the same end are treated like non-humans whose lives don't count - literally.

Photo credit: AP