650.000 dead - where does this figure come from?

It's from the Lancet. They had teams of people in Iraq knocking on random doors and asking if anyone had died in their household since the war began. Then they extrapolated those figures to get 650,000 surplus deaths (i.e deaths over and above the prewar death rate) with a 300,000 error margin; that is, they believe that the war caused between 400,000-950,000 extra deaths (all Iraqis, and of all causes).

The usual 'tens of thousands' figures come either the 55,000-61,000 from Iraqbodycount.com (which counts civilians killed by violence that are reported in the press) and the Iraqi government (which says that 100,000-150,000 dead civilians have been brought to morgues and hospitals from war-related causes).

These figures all measure different things, so the fact that the numbers are all very different doesn't necessarily mean that any of them are wrong.

In this case, the BBC report refers to 'Iraqis' who have 'been killed'; the closest fit to that language would certainly be the statistic that the Lancet report attempts to measure.

It's a fair point bringing up the Lancet figures (and thank you, previous poster, for providing the link).

But if you're going to be sneery about the BBC's accuracy, you should make sure you're being accurate as well.

The original poster wrote: "all of the 650.000 dead in Iraq died very violent deaths".

Actually, the Lancet research shows that 601,000 of the 654,000 additional deaths related to violence. Which is an astonishingly large proportion, and much more than might be expected - but not "all".

Yours, pedantically....

make it a holocaust yet?

The media has unforgivably defended Simone Clarke, the BNP ballerina. The Sunday Times and the Times printed an outright lie about anti-racist protesters outside the ballet.

Journalist Minette Marrin wrote that protesters undermined their cause by shouting, “We are Muslim, black and Jew, there are many more of us than you.

“By this threat confirming that a fear of mass immigration is not merely irrational racism. Brilliant.”

This is a distortion of this anti-BNP chant – which is actually, “We are white, black, Muslim, Jew” with the line “many more of us than you” referring to anti-racists outnumbering the BNP racists.

The paper has so far ignored my letters of complaint and the articles containing the lies remain on its website.

Marie Xenos

In response to the question about whether the number of deaths makes it a holocaust, the answer is: no.

A holocaust means wholesale destruction or sacrifice - such as the attempt by the Nazis to wipe out all of the jews.

There is no evidence that the US & UK are trying to wipe out all of the Iraq people. It is obvious that what they hoped would happen was a speedy, relatively bloodless conflict (like the first Gulf war) followed by cheerful examples of democracy once the Iraqi people were free of Saddam which they could publicise to the world. Obviously, this was naive.

Yes, Iraq is a mess where many mistakes are being made - not helped by insurgents and Iraqis blowing each other up. But it's misleading to call it a holocaust.

As for the BNP ballerina case (hi Marie) try writing again, and if they don't respond, put a letter into the Press Complaints Commission. You can find their contact details online. Would be careful about making generalisations about the media being racist, though - don't forget that the ballerina scandal would never have come to light if it hadn't been for some brave, old-fashioned, undercover reporting by a reporter on The Guardian.