Iraq Notebook
Philippines bars deployment of workers to Iraq

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The Philippines has about 50 military personnel in Iraq assisting in reconstruction. At least 4,000 Filipino civilians are working there as well.

Arabic satellite channel Al Jazeera said yesterday that gunmen had seized a Filipino man working in Iraq and threatened to kill him unless the Philippines withdraws its forces from the country within 72 hours.

U.S. attempts to verify reports on Marine

WASHINGTON — The State Department said yesterday it was trying to verify reports that a Lebanese-born U.S. Marine who disappeared in Iraq last month has turned up safe in Lebanon.

Wassef Ali Hassoun contacted family members in West Jordan, Utah, and in Tripoli, Lebanon, and told them he had contacted the U.S. Embassy in Beirut and asked to be picked up from an undisclosed location in Lebanon, CNN reported, citing a source close to the his family.

Hassoun, a Marine linguist from the First Marine Expeditionary Force, has been absent from his unit since June 21.

NBC News reported yesterday that the U.S. Navy has opened an investigation into Hassoun's disappearance, and was looking into the possibility his kidnapping was a hoax.

Call-up of veterans included musicians

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Army included 15 musicians to play at military funerals in its call-up of 5,674 discharged veterans to fill specialized jobs, U.S. Rep. Vic Snyder said during a House Armed Services Committee hearing.

The band members, three trombonists, two cornet or trumpet players, two French horn players, an electric bassist, a percussionist and a euphonium player, are members of the Individual Ready Reserve, a pool of discharged military personnel who have not already served at least eight years of active duty.
 
"If we really do need band members, we really need to increase recruiting goals" rather than send out a compulsory order for personnel "who had a low expectation they'd be called up," Snyder said in a telephone interview after the hearing.

The band members are part of what the Army considers combat-service support because they do more than play at military funerals, Army Vice Chief of Staff General Richard Cody said.

"Unfortunately, as you know, our bands do an awful lot of our burial services, as well as some other things. And the great soldiers and airmen and Marines that fought World War II are passing away at pretty high rates, and our bands are stressed across the nation," he said.

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Oil exports from southern Iraq rebounded to 1.8 million barrels a day yesterday after repairs were completed on a pipeline damaged by sabotage, an official with South Oil said. The pipeline, the smaller of two key southern export arteries linked to offshore terminals, was breached Saturday as a result of sabotage or smugglers.

The Iraqi government announced plans yesterday to conduct a national census in October. The United Nations has said the census is a necessary first step to prepare for national elections scheduled for January.

The last time an official census occurred in Iraq was in 1997. Iraq's population stood then at 19 million. That count, however, did not include three Kurdish-run provinces in the north, which have been outside the control of the central government in Baghdad since shortly after the 1991 Gulf War. This month, U.S. authorities estimated Iraq's population at 25.3 million.

Mexico has apologized to the United States and the family of a U.S. Marine whose funeral was interrupted by Mexican soldiers, but said the troops were obliged to make sure the country's weapons law wasn't violated.

The apology came late Tuesday after U.S. Ambassador Tony Garza demanded an explanation for the intrusion at the burial Sunday of Lance Cpl. Juan Lopez Rangel. The Marine was killed in Iraq and was being buried in his birthplace of San Luis de la Paz, Guanajuato.

The Foreign Ministry said the Mexican soldiers "had an obligation" to check the ceremonial rifles of the Marines.