U.S. Troops Fire at Italian Diplomat's Car in Iraq

[Seraphim]

BAGHDAD (*******) - U.S. troops opened fire on a car carrying an Italian diplomat who holds a senior position in Iraq (news - web sites)'s U.S.-led administration, killing his Iraqi interpreter, American military sources said Friday.



Pietro Cordone, senior adviser on culture for the U.S.-led authority, was unhurt, Italian Foreign Ministry sources said. Cordone has been leading efforts to recover priceless antiquities looted from museums and archeological sites since the fall of Saddam Hussein (news - web sites).


The U.S. military sources said Cordone's car was shot at after it repeatedly tried to overtake a U.S. convoy near Tikrit, Saddam's hometown.


Soldiers repeatedly warned the car not to overtake, the sources said, and opened fire when they thought the vehicle was trying to ram them.


Many Iraqis accuse U.S. troops of being too quick to open fire and failing to follow rules of engagement.


Human rights groups say many innocent Iraqis have been killed. The United States says it keeps no figures on civilian casualties.


Last week, the U.S. Army apologized after soldiers in the tense town of Falluja killed 10 Iraqi security guards and a Jordanian in a gun battle that was later described as an accident.


Locals in Falluja say U.S. troops there also killed a teen-ager Wednesday night when they opened fire after hearing celebratory gunshots from a wedding, mistakenly believing they were under attack.


Last month, a U.S. soldier shot dead award-winning ******* cameraman Mazen Dana on the outskirts of Baghdad. The U.S. Army said the soldier mistook Dana's camera for a rocket-propelled grenade launcher. (Additional reporting by David Brough in Rome)

[Deuterium]

Many Iraqis accuse U.S. troops of being too quick to open fire and failing to follow rules of engagement.


Many soldiers want to come home in one piece. Their buddies who didn't show caution HAVE come home early, in a steel box or without arms and legs.

[Gordon]

Fairplay but it doesn't do much for the hearts and minds aspect of the campaign. If I was there i'd probably shoot first and ask questions later but there are ROE that are mean't to be followed to try to minimise the chance of these kinda things happening and they seem to be quite a common occurence. Just a thought and no disrespect meant to the guys and girls over there

[Rantanplan]

Many soldiers want to come home in one piece. Their buddies who didn't show caution HAVE come home early, in a steel box or without arms and legs.

Many Iraqis want to come home in one piece. Their buddies who didn't show caution during shopping HAVE come home early, in a steel box or without arms and legs. :|

[Trigger]

Oh I get it...you copied deuterium's statement, and then replaced the word soldiers with Iraqis...Damn but you're a clever one...oh ho ho ho, stop, please I'm laughing too hard... :roll:

[JiJoMacLE45]

Those lefties and their wit. They can't even be original in their comedy.

[warchild1/27scout]

many iraqis want to come home in one piece but thier buddies fired rpg's at us soldiers cause they wanted to keep the good ole days of raping girls and murdering thier mothers and slaughtering millions of innocent people.

[Deuterium]

many iraqis want to come home in one piece but thier buddies fired rpg's at us soldiers cause they wanted to keep the good ole days of raping girls and murdering thier mothers and slaughtering millions of innocent people.


Amen to that brother. And for all you out there who have never been in a combat zone, but feel its necessary to tell those of us that have all your SAGE(insert sarcasm) wisdom, please do us all a favor and post your comments on some other website.

[Ichhabe]

Deuteriuim: enjoy this----> :bash:

[budanski]

GIs Mistakenly Kill Italian Envoy Aide

AP (http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030919/ap_on_re_mi_ea/italy_iraq_adviser&cid=540&ncid=1473)


ROME - American soldiers in northern Iraq (news - web sites) mistakenly fired on a car carrying the Italian official heading up U.S. efforts to recover Iraq's looted antiquities, killing the man's Iraqi interpreter, an official said Friday in Rome. The Italian, Pietro Cordone, was unhurt.

Cordone, who is the senior adviser for cultural affairs of the U.S. provisional authority and the top Italian diplomat in the country, was traveling between Mosul and Tikrit on Thursday when his car was fired on at a U.S. roadblock, said a Foreign Ministry official who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The official said American troops fired at the car, and that Cordone's Iraqi interpreter was killed.

The official said it appeared the car's driver did not understand signals from the American troops, and that the Americans didn't understand what the car was trying to do.

U.S. officials expressed regret over the incident, the Foreign Ministry said.

Cordone, who was born in Egypt and has spent his diplomatic career in the Arab world, was appointed in May to head up the coalition office responsible for finding and restoring Iraq's looted antiquities.

He was at the Iraqi National Museum last week when three men returned the Vase of Warka, a 5,000-year-old white limestone vessel that is one of the most valuable of the museum's artifacts.

The museum, once the home of rare Islamic texts and priceless, millennia-old collections from the Assyrian, Sumerian and Babylonian civilizations, was plundered in the chaos that followed the fall of Baghdad on April 9.

The destruction triggered an international uproar, with many curators and archaeologists from around the world blaming the United States for failing to protect the institution.

When he was named to his position, Italian Culture Minister Giuliano Urbani said Cordone's task was to recover "one of the most important artistic patrimonies" in the world.



The official said it appeared the car's driver did not understand signals from the American troops, and that the Americans didn't understand what the car was trying to do.
The driver doesn't understand 'STOP', 'GO', and 'GO THIS WAY' handsignals? It's not like the Army is giving a shopping list through hand signals.... To me this sounds like "I'm way too important to take instructions from a grunt, besides what are they gonna do about it ...

Sounds like good shooting. They got the driver who was ignoring their hand signals, and didn't injure the passenger/Italian diplomat.

Moral of the story: When an 82nd Airborne trooper says stop, stop.