UK killed many civilians in Iraq, despite claims otherwise: Guardian

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: The Guardian
22 Mar 2023 13:53

The UK government insists that no civilians were harmed during its anti-ISIS campaign in Iraq, which was launched in 2014, despite the US-led coalition admitting to murdering hundreds of civilians in the process.

Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson speaks at an event to thank the UK armed forces for their role in the Afghanistan evacuation operation earlier this year, in London, Britain, November 24, 2021 (Reuters).

The UK has made allegedly "long-standing claims British weapons did not harm a single non-combatant" in Iraq during raids supposedly aimed at ISIS in Mosul. An investigation by The Guardian revealed that the UK's 'perfect' war in Iraq in fact killed multiple civillians.

Over the years, the US and the coalition of allies it led in Iraq, have, despite UK claims, admitted to killing hundreds of Iraqi civilians while supposedly assisting Iraqi ground troops in the period following 2014.

The Guardian's investigation, which was conducted alongside the non-profit watchdog Airways, was able to distinguish six different airstrikes carried out by British forces in both 2016 and 2017 in Mosul, which led to the death of a number of civilians.

The report from the investigation included interviews with survivors of the strikes who spoke, for the first time, of the atrocities of war and the death and injury of their family members, children and civilians.

In a Mosul neighborhood, a missile explosion resulted in the death of one of the survivors' daughters. The survivor herself, the investigation noted, had both her legs amputated. Her son, who was just a toddler at the time, lost a foot and a hand, while her other daughter still has shrapnel embedded in her skull.

Another woman's home was devastated by the missile, and she nearly lost the entirety of her immediate family, which included her mother, father, two siblings, and two nephews.

According to The Guardian, the British Ministry of Defense declined to confirm or deny whether the specific strikes were conducted by its forces, and insisted that the UK had not caused any civilian deaths in Iraq.

A spokesperson said, “There is no evidence or indication that civilian casualties were caused by strikes in Syria and Iraq,” adding that “the UK always minimizes the risk of civilian casualties through our rigorous processes and carefully examines a range of evidence to do this, including comprehensive analysis of the mission data for every strike.”

UK did not do enough

The UK did not take sufficient measures to identify those killed and injured civilians, according to the 2016 Chilcot report on the UK's participation in the 2003 invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq. It stated that "a government has a responsibility to make every reasonable effort to understand the likely and actual effects of its military actions on civilians," which included improving this.

It is worth noting that in the subsequent UK campaign in Iraq, which launched in 2014, the UK government did not offer better transparency. The investigation highlighted that despite demands from Parliamentarians, the government has refused to explain anything, not even how it evaluates claimed casualties.

The US-led coalition, which includes the UK, claimed responsibility for 1,437 civilian deaths caused by strikes by its members during its operations, but did not specify which countries were behind which attacks.

Greg Bagwell, a retired British air marshal, told The Guardian that the government's rhetoric is "a stretch," as it argues that the UK made no targeting errors whatsoever in the 2014 campaign in Iraq.

“If we were saying we were 90% better than everyone else [at protecting civilians] that might be a credible argument. When you keep saying the number is zero and therefore we’re 100% perfect, it clearly becomes hard to sell that,” said Bagwell.

According to a senior coalition source who spoke to the BBC in 2018, British officials had received repeated warnings that their attacks may have killed civilians and that "to suggest they have not... is nonsense."

Even if Britain ultimately admits guilt for the murders, survivors are unlikely to be able to file a claim for compensation, The Guardian highlighted. A 2021 legislation limits any claim for "damages" to six years; that time period has already elapsed.

UK admits to murder in Iraq between 2003 and 2009

An independent investigation, published in 2021, dug into nearly 1300 allegations that British soldiers committed war crimes in Iraq between 2003 and 2009 was declared over by British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace, without a single prosecution.

1,291 allegations have been assessed since July 2017, and the Service Police Legacy Investigation, the body responsible for the investigation, had "officially closed its doors."

178 allegations had been formally pursued through 55 separate investigations, but no soldiers were prosecuted, Ben Wallace said in a written statement to Parliament.

"The vast majority of the more than 140,000 members of our armed forces who served in Iraq did so honorably," he claimed.

The defense secretary revealed that five people were referred for prosecution in 2019; however, no charges were brought against them. He asserted that some allegations were credible, but others were not. "Investigating them all posed a significant challenge," including in collecting evidence.

"Not all allegations and claims were spurious. Otherwise, investigations would not have proceeded beyond initial examination and no claims for compensation would have been paid," secretary Wallace added.

The secretary acknowledged that "shameful" and "shocking" incidents did happen in Iraq, deploring "all such incidents."

In February 2005, a UK court jailed three soldiers between 20 weeks and two years by a court-martial for abusing Iraqi civilians at a camp near Basra, southern Iraq, in 2003.

In 2007, a UK court jailed another soldier for a year in connection with the death of an Iraqi hotel receptionist, who was beaten while in British custody in 2003.