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Police Riot In Basra About 200 Police

Juan Cole 11/04/2003

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Police Riot in Basra

About 200 police gathered in front of the British Headquarters in Basra Monday to protest a reduction in their salaries from $160 a month to only $60 a month. At one point they rushed the offices of the chief British officials, and came to blows with British guards. The British troops fired over their heads, wounding one man slightly. The demonstration ended when the British permitted a delegation of 7 of them men to come into the building and negotiate with British authorities. (al-Zaman)

Basra has been quiet since major riots in August, despite occasional resprisal killings of former Baathists and some tribal feuds. The British administration of the city must be running out of funds for them to do something so unwise as to cut the pay of the Iraqi police so drastically. That decision was a riot waiting to happen, and it points to some sort of fiscal desperation on the part of Coalition authorities, about which we are not hearing in the mainstream press.

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About the Author

Juan Cole is the founder and chief editor of Informed Comment. He is Richard P. Mitchell Professor of History at the University of Michigan He is author of, among many other books, Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires and The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Follow him on Twitter at @jricole or the Informed Comment Facebook Page

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