- BAGHDAD -- Everyday, women
mill about crying outside the courtyard of Baghdad's Institute of Forensic
Medicine at Bab al Muadam Square, so overcome with grief that they are
unable to stand. The men stand grim and silent, the sleepless nights showing
on their faces. But behind the doors of, the day is just beginning as the
daily toll of postwar Iraq's crime wave gets counted.
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- Coroners have to work overtime these days to keep up
with the stream of bodies that comes through the everyday. Five coroners
distributed along the five benches of the morgue are barely able to keep
up. More than ten corpses lay around in the room as if they were in an
abattoir, with chairs for students to study the place and the events taking
place there. About 10 autopsies a day are completed here as partially decomposed
bodies pile up on autopsy tables and along the office floors awaiting final
approval for burial. From the outside, the smell of the room is enough
to make one retch; inside the stench is simply overwhelming.
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- "Neither during the war nor during the previous
two wars has this happened," said Dr. Qais Hassan Salman, a specialist
in forensic medicine at the Institute. "The number of dead is absolutely
unbelievable, and I'm just speaking of Baghdad alone. God knows what's
happening elsewhere." Coalition officials have claimed that Baghdad's
crime rates are comparable to any major US city. But in fact, judging by
coroner's reports, the Iraqi capital's homicide rate exceeds that of even
the most violent American cities several times over. Even before the war
began, Baghdad was one of the most dangerous places to live in the world.
This year's records mark more than a doubling in violent deaths.
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- "The number of deaths that need proper autopsy now
is absolutely unbelievable and I just speak of Baghdad," says Dr Salman,
"God knows what is happening in other provinces."
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- To draw an overall comparison between the morgue's records
and homicide rates is difficult. Deaths that are apparently due to intoxication,
stabbing, road accidents, shooting, burning, drowning, or other causes
are all referred to in the morgue ledgers as potential murders.
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- The population the morgue services is also broad. Of
Iraq's cities, only Baghdad, Basra, Mosul, and Baquba have forensic medicine
departments. So the Baghdad morgue must service large swathes of the center,
south and west of the country.
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- "There is no other place in Baghdad except this
one and in the past it was enough to control the number of autopsy cases
because the number in the past was more manageable than now," Salman
noted. He added that more than eleven governorates still have no forensic
departments and in most cases the corpses are brought to Baghdad to be
autopsied." In spite of the fact that three military doctors were
sent here from al-Rasheed military hospital, there is a dearth of coroners
that exceeds the institute's capacity. Previously coroners received no
more than two or three carcasses whereas now each dissector at least works
on ten carcasses per a day," Salman said.
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- Dr. Faiq Ameen Bekir, director of the Institute, emphasized
that the number of deaths has risen noticeably since the end of the war,
especially cases of shooting deaths or explosions of unexploded cluster
bombs. In the past, however, the number of gunshot death cases was far
smaller compared with the large numbers now.
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- In June of this year, 626 people died from bullet wounds;
in July the number was 734. In contrast, there were only about 50 homicides
per month in New York City in 2002. These numbers are a significant leap
from the year before - but not an overwhelming one. Indeed, death by bullet
represents only a doubling of shooting deaths last year during the days
of the former. In all there were 368 and 471 gun deaths in June or July
2002, respectively.
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- Bullet injuries come from three causes, said Dr. Salman.
The most obvious are murders, many of them committed in carjacking and
other violent robberies. But people caught in crossfire and people hit
by celebratory fire are another important part of the statistical body.
In fact, on special occasions such as the victories of the national football
team, or more recently, the death of Saddam Hussein's sons Uday and Qusay,
celebratory fire causes a spike in gun deaths. Meanwhile, suicides have
remained relatively rare, said Salman.
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- "Most of the dead that come here are young males,
but sometimes whole families are killed - such as in the al-Suleikh incident
two weeks ago, when a generator blew up near an American patrol and the
Americans opened fire at random," Salman says. A family of four was
killed in the incident.
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