UN: Baghdad security operation has failed

Sectarian violence continued to claim the lives of a large number of Iraqi civilians in Sunni Arab and Shiite neighbourhoods of Iraq’s capital, despite the coalition’s new Baghdad security plan, the UN said today.

In its first human rights report since the security plan was launched on February 14 – and began increasing US and Iraqi troops levels in the capital - the UN Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) said civilian casualties in the daily violence between January and March remained high, concentrated in and around Baghdad.