Turning Corners

Another unfortunate event, in an unnecessary conflict, with so many unintended consequences, and a tragic number of casualties.

Meal Sickens Hundreds of Iraqi Police Recruits
By Doug Smith and Zeena Kareem, Times Staff Writers
2:50 PM PDT, October 9, 2006

BAGHDAD -- Several hundred Iraqi police recruits were being treated today in an outbreak of severe food poisoning that triggered a mutinous episode in southern Iraq, and the capital was shaken by the assassination of the vice president's brother.

Officials in Numaniyah, about 75 miles southeast of Baghdad, said disorder broke out at a military base there today, the day after the recruits became ill. Angry recruits stoned the car of their commander....

"I thought someone hiding somewhere was sniping at them with a silencer," said a base security official who would only give the name Ali.

Poisoning kills 7 Iraqi police
Mon Oct 9, 2006 10:27 AM BST147
NUMANIYA, Iraq (Reuters)

At least seven policemen died and hundreds of others fell ill after suffering food poisoning on Sunday evening in the town of Numaniya, south of Baghdad, police sources at the base said on Monday...

The policemen, nearly all Shi'ite Muslims from southern Iraq, blamed several people most notably a Sunni contractor providing food for the military base where the police were "re-training". But Qasim and other Shi'ites did not say they believed the poisoning had sectarian motives.

Iraq arrests cooks after hundreds of police poisoned
AFP
October 10, 2006

KUT, Iraq -- Iraqi authorities arrested a produce supplier and four cooks after hundreds of police fell sick at their training barracks in an apparent bout of food poisoning, a spokesman said Monday. Interior ministry spokesman Brigadier General Abdel-Karim Khalaf dismissed earlier reports from officers at the barracks that three officers had died, but confirmed that an investigation was underway involving the five suspects. "For the moment, we are still proceeding on the basis that this was unintentional. For the moment," he said.

Sad.