24 DECEMBER
BRITISH ARMY MAKES NO ATTEMPT TO PREVENT EXECUTION OFÂ IRAQI CHRISTIAN.
[ 24 December 2003 ]
On this day in 2003 British soldiers failed to intervene when local Shia militia executed a Christian man in the town’s main marketplace for the crime of selling alcohol. Over the preceding months, following the joint British-American invasion in March, London had steadily reduced the number of British troops in southern Iraq, so that it became impossible for them to take any proactive role in rebuilding the city’s government and infrastructure, and were instead forced to allow the pro-Iranian islamists to take over the police. [1]
FOOTNOTES
- John Newsinger (2015), “British Counterinsurgency,” Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke, Hampshire, p223-224.