An Iraqi mother writes a letter to U.S. officials asking for an investigation

This is taken from an Iraqi blog, Healing Iraq...

On Saturday the 3rd of January 2004, my son and his cousin were travelling back to our residence in Samarra, they were driving a small cargo truck belonging to a third party from which they earn their livelihood in a country torn by wars and sanctions. Yes, they were back from Baghdad yet misfortune followed them from the beginning, their car broke down on the road which caused a delay in their arrival to Samarra when the curfew hour was just about to start in the city...And this is where the first chapter of the tragedy takes place. An American army patrol stood in their way, and after they went through the whole procedure of searching my son and his cousin, and inspecting the cargo load, they tied them up both and led them to an area about three kilometres from the scene and...in front of one of the gates of the Tharthar dam where water flows at its strongest rate and to my son and his cousin's horror, they ordered them to jump into the water, it was midnight and the cold was unbearable, when they hesitated, they were pushed by the soldiers. Unfortunately my boy cannot swim, even though swimming at this time of the year wouldn't have helped. Yet my sons cousin survived miraculously after he got stuck in a tree branch to give us his account of this tragic event which could have went untold. He tried saving my son, but the water current was stronger than him...

Read the whole account and update on the situation here.

I surfed around this blog for a bit. Interestingly, there are several sidebar links to American soldiers' blogs (three of which I glanced at and which contained sentiments that I would expect - rah, rah U.S.A.) There's also a page of links to photos in and around Baghdad taken by the blogger. Very interesting. Have a look. Check out the pool halls.

....but hey, do what you want....you will anyway.