Iraqi Panel: Security Personnel Used Excessive Force on Protesters

An official Iraqi committee looking into recent anti-government protests in which over 150 people were killed has concluded that security forces used too heavy a hand on demonstrators. The unrest came at the beginning of October, with protesters accusing the government of corruption and doing little about high unemployment and the high cost of living. A report issued by the panel on Tuesday said too much live fire had been used against the demonstrators. “The committee found that officers and commanders lost control over their forces during the protests [and that this] caused chaos,” the report said, adding that shells from a sniper rifle had been found in an abandoned building. In the wake of the protests, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the country’s senior Shi’ite cleric, demanded to know whether the snipers were government forces or members of Iranian-controlled militias that the Iraqi military is trying to integrate into the country’s official armed forces.