Mercenaries open fire on women and children in Iraq
(Pictures are below the text.)
Three weeks after Blackwater gunned down 17 Iraqi civilians in Baghdad’s Baghdad's Nisoor Square, another group of mercenaries murdered two women in a car in Baghdad’s Karrada district, a commercial and residential area that is one of the most secure in Baghdad.
The murder victims were Geneva Jalal, 30, and Marou Awanis, 48. Awanis had lately been using her car to drive government employees to work to help raise money for her three daughters. Her husband died during heart surgery last year.
Both victims were Armenian Christians.
The killings happened on the same day the Iraqi government requested that Blackwater pay compensation to the families of 17 murder victims gunned down on Sept 16.
The mercenaries in this latest massacre were employed by Unity Resources Group, which is owned by Australian partners. Unity is registered in Singapore. Its operating headquarters are in Dubai. Unity has worked in Iraq since 2004, according to its web site, and is on a U.S. State Department list of security firms doing business in Iraq. It is completely immune from Iraqi law, as are all foreign security firms.
At 2:30 pm, four armored SUVs— three white and one gray — were about 100 yards from a main intersection in the Shiite-controlled district. The SUVs carried mercenaries for Unity Resources. A white Oldsmobile moved into the crossroads. In the front seat were two women. In the back seat were a woman and two children. As the women approached the four Unity vehicles, two of the mercenaries fired warning shots into the air. The women panicked, thinking they had entered a massacre scene, and drove forward to escape, trying to steer wide of the convoy. Mercenaries fired into the car’s radiator, causing coolant to spill on the street, but the car kept rolling. Then one of the Unity mercenaries got out and used his machine gun to blast the car, while a second mercenary opened up from the back of one of the SUVs. Both women were shot in the head. The woman in the back seat was shot in the shoulder. The children survived, but were hit by flying glass.
Immediately the mercenaries fled the scene, leaving the women in a pool of blood, with the children screaming in the back seat. A policeman at the scene said the mercenaries were masked and wearing khaki uniforms.
Iraqi police collected the bodies and towed the vehicle away. As twilight set in, family members gathered beside the car in a dirt alley outside the police station, staring at the blood and hair on the inside of the windshield. (See below.)
Like Blackwater and the other mercenary firms, Unity has been involved in many murders. In March 2006, Unity issued a statement of apology after one of its mercenaries gunned down a 72-year-old Iraqi-born Australian, Kays Juma, at a security checkpoint in Baghdad.
Unity mercenaries operate throughout Iraq. They escort workers for RTI International, a group based in Research Triangle Park, N.C., that is involved in construction projects. A Bush administration official said the State Department bears no responsibility for overseeing RTI’s security operations, and thus no responsibility for Unity mercenaries.
At the time of the murders, Unity mercenaries had transported RTI personnel, and were returning to their base of operations.
On the same day, at least 57 Iraqis were killed in bombings and shootings across Iraq.
(This info was collected from multiple different web sites.)
Meanwhile the people of Iraq will suffer more heart attacks and die in surgery.
Really more like dying of a broken heart.
This is how they liberate Iraqis literally from their own life. Bush probably regards this as the ultimate liberation. I wonder when Iraqis will wake up and storm on these mercenaries and those who employ them in a manner of the French revolution.
"Let there be Light!"