Red Crescent Official: U.S.-led multinational forces pose greater threat to the RC than insurgents

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By Lisa Schlein
Geneva
15 December 2006


Red Crescent Official: Dealing with US Troops is Main Difficulty in Iraq

A senior official of the Iraqi Red Crescent says the humanitarian situation in Iraq is rapidly deteriorating because of the sectarian violence. He says one of the main problems the organization encounters is the treatment of its volunteers by the multinational forces.

The vice president of the Iraqi Red Crescent, Jamal Al-Karbouli, says the U.S.-led multinational forces pose a greater threat to the organization's humanitarian operations in Iraq than do the insurgents.

"They give us hard time. They (attack) some offices and they detain some volunteers and last … just before seven days in Fallujah, we have our office attacked by American forces. They have detained volunteers and staff for more than two hours and they burned the car and even the building belonging to us, to the Red Crescent."

He says Red Crescent offices in Baghdad, Anbar and Najaf provinces have been repeatedly targeted by U.S.-led multi-national forces searching for insurgents.

A Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Todd Vician (Vih-she-an) says he is not familiar with the particular incidents cited in the report, but he can say that coalition forces search buildings throughout Iraq based on what he called "actionable intelligence." He says these searches are not attacks, and that individuals are detained "when they are perceived to be a security threat." He says the coalition continues "to seek ways to work with aid organizations and groups trying to improve the economic situation in Iraq."

http://www.voanews.com/english/2006-12-15-voa30.cfm



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