BBC
reports that "John Pace, until recently UN human rights chief in Iraq, told the BBC News website that up to 75% of the corpses showed signs of extrajudicial death."
How many death squad killings is that?
"Between 780 and 1,110 corpses had been brought in every month over the past year, Mr Pace said."
That is between 585 and 832 deaths by torture or execution per month over the past year. Each month for a year.
How is that possible?
"Fears have grown among Iraqis that Shia death squads are operating with semi-official government approval," and that "There is no deliberate intention to suppress information [about executions and killings]," he said.
"More likely it is considered as something [the government] would rather not admit to."
The Guardian UK
reports
Faik Bakir, the director of the Baghdad morgue, has fled Iraq in fear of his life after reporting that more than 7,000 people have been killed by death squads in recent months, the outgoing head of the UN human rights office in Iraq has disclosed.
Also in the Guardian article, Mr. Pace names names,
Mr Pace, whose contract in Iraq ended last month, said many killings were carried out by Shia militias linked to the industry ministry run by Bayan Jabr, a leading figure in the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (Sciri).
What is the cumulative effect of this type of internal semi-official terror? Brain Drain, at a time that Iraq can little afford to lose talent, also according to the Guardian article,
Reports of government-sponsored death squads have sparked fear among many prominent Iraqis, prompting a rise in the number leaving the country.
Contrast this metric for chaos; "Mr. Pace described the Baghdad mortuary as a 'barometer' of the situation in the city at any one time", against Mr. Bush's frequent incantation
touting "U.S. successes in helping Iraq improve its economy and infrastructure. The president focused on reconstruction efforts, saying U.S. strategy has shifted from large projects to smaller jobs that can be completed quickly, such as sewer lines and city roads." - that was in 2005; what does reconstruction look like today?
Truthout.org reports on 2/28, that
Washington - The US State Department is winding down its $20 billion reconstruction program in Iraq and the only new rebuilding money in its latest budget request is for prisons, officials said on Tuesday.
State Department Iraq coordinator James Jeffrey told reporters he was asking Congress for $100 million for prisons but no other big building projects were in the pipeline for the department's 2006 supplemental and 2007 budget requests for Iraq, which total just over $4 billion.
"This is the one bit of construction we will be doing - $100 million for additional bed capacity for the Iraqi legal system," he said.