Iraq panel denies convoy provoked

BAGHDAD — The widow of an Iraqi vice-presidential guard killed by a Blackwater USA employee said Sunday she had yet to receive compensation, and Iraq's government concluded that another shooting by the private security firm's guards last month was unjustified.

A statement from government spokesman Ali Dabbagh said a commission formed by Prime Minister Nouri al- Maliki to investigate the Sept. 16 shooting had finished its work and concluded the Blackwater convoy was not fired on "directly or indirectly, and was not even hit by a stone."

The panel also said 17 Iraqis died in the shooting, not 11 as has been previously reported, and 27 were wounded.

Blackwater says the violence erupted after its convoy came under fire in a crowded Baghdad intersection. Iraqi witnesses say the gunfire was unprovoked and typical of what most Iraqis see as the cowboy attitude exercised by private security companies contracted to guard high-level officials in Iraq.

Another investigative body composed of U.S. and Iraqi government officials held its first meeting Sunday. It issued a statement saying it would make recommendations on how to ensure that personal security companies "do not endanger public safety."

An FBI investigation also is under way into the September shooting, which has shed light on other incidents involving Blackwater and sparked Iraqi demands that foreign security companies be subject to Iraqi law or banned from the country.

Next to the September shooting, the Blackwater incident receiving the most publicity involves Raheem Khalif Hulaichi, who was on guard duty the night of Dec. 24, 2006, at Vice President Adel Abdul Mehdi's compound inside Baghdad's fortified Green Zone.

Witnesses, whose accounts are contained in State Department memos presented to a congressional committee looking into Blackwater, said the private guard who shot him was visibly drunk and smelled of alcohol.

The employee, Seattle-area resident Andrew Moonen, told investigators he shot the guard in self-defense.

Hulaichi left a widow, Umm Sajjad, 30, and two sons, ages 6 and 10. They live in a small rented house in Sadr City, the sprawling slum in northeastern Baghdad.

Even though Blackwater and the State Department agreed that the family should receive $15,000 compensation, Umm Sajjad said they had not received money yet because the vice president's office felt the sum was too low.

"The money of the whole world is not able to compensate for my husband, but what I want is enough to guarantee my children's future ... and to buy a house," she said Sunday.

A security official in the vice president's office who has been leading negotiations on the family's behalf, Azad Jaff, said they were demanding $100,000. Jaff said Blackwater had forwarded $20,000, but the vice president's office thought it was insufficient.

Blackwater did not respond Sunday to requests for comment.

The Sept. 16 incident was one of at least six involving deaths allegedly caused by Blackwater that authorities here have brought to the attention of the Americans.

Information from The Associated Press is included in this report.