Letter: Justice for victims of attack on Haditha
Two years ago today, on November 19 2005, a group of US marines went on a five-hour rampage in the Iraqi city of Haditha, killing 24 civilians - including seven women and three children - after a roadside bomb hit their Humvee, killing the driver. Nine-year-old survivor Eman Waleed later told Time magazine: "First they went into my father's room, where he was reading the Qur'an and we heard shots ... I watched them shoot my grandfather first in the chest and then in the head. Then they killed my granny."
Shockingly, Haditha was not an anomaly. Indeed, according to a 2006 survey - described by the MoD's chief scientific officer as "employing methods ... regarded as 'close to best practice'" - coalition forces have killed at least 186,000 Iraqis since the 2003 invasion.
Consistent with this, a secret 2006 report on the Haditha killings by a US army general (which was subsequently leaked to the press) found that: "Statements made by the chain of command ... suggest that Iraqi civilian lives are not as important as US lives, their deaths are just the cost of doing business", and that "all levels of command tended to view civilian casualties, even in significant numbers, as routine".
To date, legal proceedings against the marines involved in the Haditha killings have been a circus. Two years on, we demand justice for the people of Haditha and an end to British complicity in this murderous occupation.
Justin Alexander and Dora-Marie Goulet
Christian Peacemaker Teams UK
Howard Clark
War Resisters International
Maya Anne Evans
Justice Not Vengeance
Martin Newell
London Catholic Worker
Jonathan Stevenson
Iraq Occupation Focus, Sue Wood Voices UK
Helen Jeans