A Red Cross report titled "Civilians without Protection: The Ever-Worsening Humanitarian Crisis in Iraq" was prepared after the American military surge in Baghdad began on Feb. 14. The assessment described conditions in Iraq, where a third of the population lives in poverty, unemployment is skyrocketing and food shortages are increasing.
Britain's Mirror reported, "Water, sewage and electricity systems are close to collapse. ... There is a critical lack of medical care as doctors and nurses do not dare to visit hospitals and clinics because they are targeted and threatened." More than half the doctors have fled the country following the murder or abduction of colleagues.
The Red Cross report concluded the people in "liberated" Iraq are caught in desperation. "Their lives and dignity are continuously under threat. The humanitarian situation is steadily worsening and affecting all Iraqis," the report stated. ...
Kraehenbuehl told the Associated Press how one of his Red Cross colleagues polled several Iraqi women, asking them what "their most pressing need was."
After a long silence, one of the women answered with a request that ought to be repeated to every member of Congress and included in every statement they make about Iraq: "The most important thing that anyone could do is to help collect the bodies that line the streets in front of our homes every morning. No one dares to touch them, but for us it is unbearable to have to expose our children to such images every day as we try to bring them to school."
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