U.N.: Iraq Withholding Death Figures

U.N. officials accused the Iraqi government Wednesday of withholding civilian death figures to avoid portraying a "very grim" situation, adding that the humanitarian crisis was worsening despite the U.S.-led Baghdad security crackdown.

Those findings, contained in a human rights report by the U.N. Assistance Mission for Iraq, drew a sharp rebuke from the Iraqi government, which said "this unbalanced report" called into question the credibility of the U.N. staff here.

The report covered the three months ending March 31 and avoided any judgment of the military effectiveness of the security operation, which was formally launched in mid-February.

Nevertheless, the report raised questions about the impact of military operations on Iraqi civilians, alleging, for example, that whole families were often taken into custody at random during security sweeps.

"The government of Iraq continued to face immense security challenges in the face of growing violence and armed opposition to its authority and the rapidly worsening humanitarian crisis," the report said, adding that "the use of torture and other inhumane treatment" in government detention centers "continues to be of utmost concern."

Those findings are likely to fuel the debate in the United States over calls from the Democratic-controlled Congress to begin withdrawing U.S. troops by Oct. 1. The report could also complicate U.S. and Iraqi efforts to win commitments from Iraq's neighbors for substantial financial aid during a regional conference in Egypt next week.

"Accusing the Iraqi government of not releasing the civilian death toll with the goal of understating casualties and underplaying detentions, the U.N. Assistance Mission for Iraq's human rights report has already become the target of both U.S. and Iraqi officials," said CBS News foreign affairs analyst Pamela Falk from the United Nations.

In the report, the U.N. mission noted that government officials had claimed "an initial drop" in the number of killings in late February following the launch of the Baghdad security plan. But the report said the number of casualties "rose again in March."

That finding was based on Iraqi and foreign media reports of attacks, the United Nations said. The report was unable to provide official, comprehensive death figures because the Iraqi government refused to release them.

During a press conference, U.N. human rights officer Ivana Vuco said the government did not give an official reason for refusing to release the numbers.

But she said the government was apparently "becoming increasingly concerned about the figures being used to portray the situation as very grim."

"Unofficially, however, in a number of follow up meetings to their decision, we were told that there were concerns that the people would construe the figures to portray the situation negatively and that would further undermine their efforts to establish some kind of security and stability in the country," she said.

In a statement, the Iraqi government expressed deep reservations about the report, terming it "inaccurate in presenting information" and lacking "credibility in many of its points."

"Also, it lacks balance in presenting the situation of the human rights situation in Iraq," the statement added.

"The publication of this unbalanced report ... puts the credibility of the U.N. office in Iraq on stake and it aggravates the humanitarian crisis in Iraq instead of solving it," the government said.

The statement offered no explanation for withholding casualty figures nor provided any numbers.

However, government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh told The Associated Press that the system for tabulating casualty figures "is not easy" because "in the recent period, the number of casualties increased."

Al-Dabbagh cited confusion over casualty figures from the April 12 suicide attack in the Iraqi parliament building. The U.S. military first reported eight deaths but then lowered the figure to one the following day.

"Even the casualties of the parliament explosion were not accurately counted," he said.

The furor draws attention to the absence of a comprehensive, accurate count of the number of Iraqis who have died since the war began in March 2003.

Last year, a study by British scientists published in The Lancet medical journal concluded that more than 600,000 Iraqis had been killed since the U.S.-led invasion. President George W. Bush said he did not consider it "a credible report."

Iraq Body Count, a private group that relies on published reports, estimates the civilian death toll for the war between about 62,400 and 68,430.

Figures compiled by The Associated Press from police reports show that violent deaths have declined in Baghdad since the start of the security operation but have increased outside the capital.

The most dramatic decline has been in the number of bodies found across the capital, usually attributed to sectarian death squads. At least 1,041 bodies were found in Baghdad between Feb. 14 and April 24, compared with at least 2,273 bodies during the 70 days before the crackdown, the AP figures show.

But uncertainty over the accuracy of government reports raises questions about the validity of trend analyses based on death figures.

U.S. officials said Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's government was trying to establish a centralized system for tabulating and releasing casualty figures to avoid a welter of conflicting numbers.

In the past, different ministries often released their own figures, raising suspicions that the numbers were raised or lowered for political reasons.

U.N. spokesman Said Arikat said the government complained last January that the U.N.'s death count was exaggerated. But Arikat insisted the U.N. count was based on "the most carefully screened figures."

The U.N. report issued in January found that 34,452 civilians were killed last year, including 6,376 in November and December. Those figures were higher than any released by government agencies.

The United Nations said its figures were based on information from the Iraqi Health Ministry, hospitals across the country and the Medico-Legal Institute in Baghdad.

The U.N. report said that on March 1, Iraq's Ministry of Interior, which controls the police, announced that 1,646 civilians had been killed nationwide in February, most of them in Baghdad.

"It is unclear on what basis these figures were compiled," the report said.

Despite the uncertainty over precise figures, the U.N. report insisted that violence remains high throughout the country, with indiscriminate killings and assassinations by insurgents, militias and other armed groups.

"In February and March, sectarian violence claimed the lives of large numbers of civilians, including women and children, in both Shia and Sunni neighborhoods of Baghdad," the report said.

It also said Iraqis detained in security sweeps face lengthy detentions, often with insufficient evidence.