could someone please give me a source for the un/afghanistan 'beheadings' that's not a tabloid,

[Hannah Bell]

free republic, or the usual internet propaganda sites?

i'm trying to track down source of this report & keep coming back to UK tabloids & hate sites.

thanks.

[Justitia]

1. Reuters via Huffington Post?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/04/01/afghanistan-koran-protest-un-workers-killed_n_843562.html

[leftstreet]

2. That Reuters story is worth reading. Lots of contradictions

Beheadings...not beheadings
Someone said...someone else contradicted

Very poorly reported

Thanks for the link

[Hannah Bell]

3. thank you. so this guy is the source, per reuters:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/04/01/afghanistan-koran-protest-un-workers-killed_n_843562.html


and the un killings had nothing to do with koran burnings in the us.


he's spokesperson for the pamir corps (police in the N/NE):

Some claim that member of the Afghan police force are colluding with insurgents, making deals and even fighting with the Taliban against the army.

December 21, 2009

An Afghan National Army, ANA, commander says efforts to combat the growing insurgency in the previously stable north are being frustrated by police failings

General Abdul Rahman Rahmani, commander of the 209 Shahin Army Corps, based in Mazar-e-Sharif, says over the past year the ANA has launched operations in four northern provinces to drive out Taliban and other militant groups, but the police have been unable to hold territory once the army has moved on, allowing the insurgents to regroup.

Kunduz, Baghlan, Faryab and Balkh provinces have been cleared of groups several times," Rahmani said. "But the achievements have not been protected. After a short time, the insurgents are able to retake the territory. So the army conducts another operation. This leads to rising casualties and low morale. Army soldiers leave; they stop fighting."

Mohammad Ali Rezayi, deputy commander of the 303 Pamir Zone Corps, which polices the north and northeast of the country, insisted that his officers take their responsibilities seriously, but lacked manpower to control areas after military operations.

http://www.alternet.org/world/144713/afghan_national_army:_afghan_police_are_doing_more_harm_than_good.

so far as I can tell this is the only legit media source, but some DU posters are running with it & telling the tale as if everyone who died was beheaded & it was all about burning korans in the US.

[The Magistrate]

4. The Times Account Is Pretty Clear On Motive, Ma'am

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/02/world/asia/02afghanistan.html?_r=1

"Friday’s episode began when three mullahs, addressing worshipers at Friday Prayer inside the Blue Mosque here, one of Afghanistan’s holiest places, urged people to take to the streets to agitate for the arrest of Terry Jones, the Florida pastor who oversaw the burning of a Koran on March 20.

Otherwise, said the most prominent of them, Mullah Mohammed Shah Adeli, Afghanistan should cut off relations with the United States. “Burning the Koran is an insult to Islam, and those who committed it should be punished,” he said.

The crowd — some of its members carrying signs reading “Down with America” and “Death to Obama” — poured into the streets and swelled. Gov. Atta Muhammad Noor of Balkh Province, of which Mazar-i-Sharif is the capital, later put the number at 20,000. According to Lal Mohammad Ahmadzai, spokesman for Gen. Daoud Daoud, the Afghan National Police commander for the country’s north, the crowd soon overwhelmed the United Nations guards, disarming some and beating and shooting others.

Gen. Abdul Rauf Taj, the deputy police commander for Balkh Province, put the death toll at eight foreign United Nations staff members, but he said there had not been any beheadings. “Police tried to stop them, but protesters began stoning the building, and finally the situation got out of control,” he said.

Mr. Ahmadzai, however, put the death toll at 10 foreigners in the United Nations compound, 8 killed by gunshots and 2 beheaded."

[Hannah Bell]

6. and other accounts distinguish between protestors & the reported "insurgents"

who attacked the un facility.

and i want to know how 20,000 people fit in one mosque.

and this, like the other, has one guy saying "beheadings" & another guy saying "no beheadings".

[The Magistrate]

8. The Reuters Account Does Not Distinguish Between Protester And Rebel, Ma'am

It quotes a claim insurgents took advantage of the crowd of protesters, made by a provincial governor. It might well be in his interest on several levels to play down the degree of disaffection among the people of his capital, and instead put the blame on 'insurgents' appearing on cue among the protesters.

The matter of be-headings is said to rest on early reports, later denied. This, too, can be regarded from more than one direction: initial reports are indeed often inaccurate; be-headings are very bad publicity, and discreditable to the authorities.

The report does not say 20,000 were present in the Blue Mosque; it gives that as an estimate of the size of the crowd by the time it reached the U.N. facility. It is a commonplace that protest marches pick up adherents as they move when the cause is popular, and it is also a commonplace that estimates of crowd size can be innacurate, in either direction. The Blue Mosque is a pretty sizeable venue, however, and there is great deal of open pavement around it.

[Hannah Bell]

9. It may be. Or it may not be. There is no way knowing from the article.

"The governor of Balkh province said insurgents had used the march as cover to attack the compound, in a battle that raged for several hours and raises serious questions about plans to make the city a pilot for security transfer to national forces."

His claim is as reliable as anyone else's in this picture.

As the only claim about the koran-burning is that some preachers talked about it in the mosque, how many people do you think fit in that mosque? 1000? 2000? 3000? 5000?

Maybe they tweeted the other 15,000 people or something?

"Ooooooh, an american preacher burned a koran, let's go behead the un staff!"

interesting to me who's so far been reported as dead or wounded. not americans.

[Tx4obama]

5. From AJE

Excerpt

Afghan police earlier put the death toll at eight UN workers and four Afghan protesters. Two of the UN staff members were beheaded, according to police, though details of the killings are unclear.

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2011/04/201141152010414184.html

[Hannah Bell]

7. "police" = the guy quoted in the reuters article. there's another guy who says

different.

but i know, it's too much to ask some people to hold off flogging "beheadings" until there's a confirmed report.

feels more & more like 911 days, when there were beheadings every other day under bush.