AP - As of Thursday, Nov. 29, 2007, at least 3,880 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. The figure includes eight military civilians. At least 3,161 died as a result of hostile action, according to the military’s numbers.
Reuters - U.S. President George W. Bush on
Thursday stepped up pressure on lawmakers to pass his Iraq war
funding request, while a senior Democrat said a deal might be
possible.
AP - The American military discovered there are fewer Iraqi civilians serving as volunteer guards in their home areas than it had thought, saying accounting mistakes had inflated the number by thousands.
Reuters - About 550 Australian combat troops in
Iraq should be withdrawn by about the middle of next year,
Prime Minister-elect Kevin Rudd said on Friday, setting a broad
timetable for the soldiers to return home.
AP - President Bush sternly pressed Democrats to approve money to fund the Iraq war “without strings and without delay” before leaving town for the Christmas holidays, something congressional leaders have already indicated they will not do.
Reuters - The United States, under fire for
the slow pace it has taken in Iraqi refugees, said on Thursday
it hoped to soon handle refugee applications in Iraq for local
employees of the U.S. embassy in Baghdad.
AP - Two unidentified witnesses appeared Thursday before a federal grand jury investigating Blackwater Worldwide, a government contractor whose security guards were involved in a shooting that killed 17 Iraqi civilians in Baghdad.
AFP - Flanked by the US military brass at the Pentagon, President George W. Bush appealed to Congress Thursday to end an impasse over funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
AP - Iraq’s prime minister has appealed to President Bush to hand over Saddam Hussein’s cousin, known as “Chemical Ali,” and two other former regime officials sentenced to hang for a 1980s crackdown against Kurds, two government officials said Thursday.
Bloomberg - Nov. 29 (Bloomberg) — Democratic Representative John Murtha
said he is “optimistic'' that House Democrats and President
George W. Bush can agree on Iraq war funding after an earlier $50
billion proposal linked to troop withdrawals was blocked in the
Senate.