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August 03, 2005
Why Was Journalist Stephen Vincent Killed?
Jenny Booth at Times Online notes that, "There is speculation" that Steven Vincent, the "freelance American journalist" and blogger who was killed in basra, Iraq on August 3, 2005,
was murdered in an attempt to silence him. Four days before his death he had written an opinion piece in The New York Times in which he said that the police force in the British-controlled city had been infiltrated by Shia Muslim extremist militias, who were responsible for carrying out hundreds of murders of prominent Sunni Muslims. He criticized the British, whose 8,000 troops in the area are responsible for security in Basra, for turning a blind eye to abuses of power by Shia extremists. The whole city was "increasingly coming under the control of Shia religious groups, from the relatively mainstream... to the bellicose followers of the rebel cleric Moqtada al-Sadr."In his final blog," Ms. Booth said, Mr. Vincent wrote:
The British stand above the growing turmoil, refusing to challenge the Islamists’ claim on the hearts and minds of police officers.I suspect the British know this is a battle they will never win.
See "Basra blogger is abducted and murdered" for another reason why Mr. Vincent may have been killed.
Posted by Munir Umrani at August 3, 2005 05:08 PM
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