- As Venezuela key opposition leaders seized after poll
The United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) on Tuesday said violence, terrorist acts and armed conflicts across Iraq killed a total of 239 civilians and wounded 273 others in July.
A UNAMI statement said figures of casualties do not include security members, as the Iraqi military declined to give information about casualties among the troops.
Previous figures of security members’ casualties released by UNAMI were questioned by the Iraqi military as “inaccurate,” while UNAMI responded “the military figures were largely unverified.”
Most of the civilian casualties occurred in Iraq’s northern province of Nineveh, where 121 were killed and 112 others injured in battles between Iraqi forces and Islamic State (IS) militants in western Mosul.
Jan Kubis, the UN envoy to Iraq and the UNAMI chief, condemned the terrorist actions by IS group.
Kubis said the actions had caused enormous suffering to civilians by using them as human shields up to the final moments before the group was crushed in Mosul and victory declared by the government of Iraq on July 10.
Kubis reiterated his call to protect civilians in the conflict as the Iraqi forces prepare for further offensives to “liberate the remaining parts of the country from the scourge of Daesh (IS group).
“As we commend the Iraqi forces’ humanitarian concept of operations that has put civilian protection and assistance to IDPs (Internally displaced people) at the centre of the battle plan for Mosul.
“It is imperative that the protection of civilians continues to be the top priority in the conduct of military operations going forward,’’ the statement added.
UNAMI statement came as the Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi on July 10 officially declared Mosul’s liberation from IS after nearly nine months of fierce fighting to dislodge the extremist militants from their last major stronghold in Iraq.
On July 29, Abadi declared a new plan to be implemented soon to liberate the IS-held town of Tal Afar from the extremist militants, which will include the participation of the predominantly Shiite paramilitary Hashd Shaabi units and Sunni tribal fighters.
The Iraqi forces still have to wage more offensives to drive out IS militants from their redoubts in Hawijah in southwestern Kirkuk.
Many blame the current chronic instability, cycle of violence, and the emergence of extremist groups, such as the IS, on the U.S. that invaded and occupied Iraq in March 2003, under the pretext of seeking to destroy weapons of mass destruction in the country.
The war led to the ouster and eventual execution of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, but no such weapons had been found.
In the meantime, two Venezuelan opposition leaders, Leopoldo López and Antonio Ledezma, have been re-arrested in a move condemned internationally.
They were under house arrest after accusations of inciting violence during anti-government protests in 2014.
The two have been taken to Ramo Verde military jail, family members say.
The Supreme Court, which critics say is dominated by government loyalists, said it had received intelligence reports alleging the two were trying to flee.
The court also said that it had revoked Mr Ledezma’s and Mr López’s house arrest because they had made political statements.
The UN’s High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein, said he was “deeply concerned” that the pair had been taken back into custody.
The move comes just two days after a controversial vote for a constitutional assembly saw violence on the streets, with at least 10 people killed.
President Nicolás Maduro convened the assembly to rewrite Venezuela’s constitution amid spiralling anti-government protests on 1 May.
He argued that the move would create peace and foster dialogue by bringing together different sectors of Venezuela’s polarised society.
But the opposition accused the president of trying to rewrite the constitution in order to maximise his power and sideline the opposition-controlled legislature.
They boycotted the vote and called on Venezuelans to take to the streets in protest. The election was condemned by Latin American leaders, the European Union and the US.
The day of the election was the deadliest so far since the current wave of protest began.
US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin announced on Monday that the US had imposed sanctions on President Maduro and called him a “dictator who disregards the will of the Venezuelan people”.
Additional report from BBC