Iraq civilian death toll hit 6,878 last year
United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq says figures are ‘absolute minimum’ and that 12,388 were also wounded
BAGHDAD // The United Nations said at least 6,878 civilian Iraqis were violently killed last year, as the Iraqi government struggles to maintain security nationwide and to dislodge ISIL militants from areas under their control.
The United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq, known as Unami, said its numbers had to be considered as the absolute minimum, because it has not been able to verify casualties among civilians in conflict areas and of those who lost their lives as a result of the “secondary effects of violence from exposure to the elements, lack of water, food, medicine and health care”.
Figures did not include casualties among civilians in Iraq’s western Anbar province for the months of May, July, August and December, it said on Monday.
Unami said 12,388 other civilians were also wounded last year. At least 7,515 civilians were killed in 2015. The monthly UN casualty report for December last year showed that 386 civilians were killed and another 1,066 were wounded. The worst- affected area was the northern province of Nineveh, where government forces are fighting to retake the ISIL- held city of Mosul, with 208 civilians killed and 511 injured.
The capital, Baghdad, came next with 109 civilians killed and 523 injured.
ISIL has claimed responsibility for a string of bombings in Baghdad that have killed more than 50 people in the past week alone.
“This is, no doubt, an attempt by Daesh to divert attention from their losses in Mosul and, unfortunately, it is the innocent civilians who are paying the price,” said Jan Kubis, the special representative of the UN secretary-general for Iraq. The group attacked a police station in the Iraqi city of Samarra on Monday night, killing three members of the force, officers said yesterday.
According to security officials from Salaheddin province, in which Samarra is located, a group of four gunmen wearing suicide vests stormed the Mutawakil police station in Samarra.
They hid in the police station and were subsequently besieged by Iraqi security forces, leading to clashes that lasted several hours.
“The exchange of fire started around 9pm and lasted way past midnight,” said a Samarra police colonel. “The four suicide bombers who attacked the police station were all killed. “Three members of the police were also killed, including a lieutenant colonel, and four were wounded,” he said. Samarra is home to a major Iraqi security headquarters and an important Shiite shrine where a bombing in 2006 sparked two years of sectarian violence.
ISIL has claimed responsibility for bombings in Baghdad that have killed more than 50 people in the past week alone