Iraq's monthly death toll declines in May

The monthly death toll among Iraqis from violence declined in May to its lowest level since the beginning of the year, Iraqi authorities said on Wednesday.

Figures compiled by Iraqi ministries of Interior, Defense and Health showed that 177 people have been killed by the attacks in May across the country, including 102 civilians and 75 security members.

May's death toll was the lowest since December 2010, when the authorities announced the death of 151 Iraqis.

The decline in deaths last month came despite the ongoing wave of violence across the country, including several deadly attacks, particularly a massive bomb attacks in the ethnically mixed city of Kirkuk, some 250 km north of Baghdad, that claimed the lives of 29 people, most of them were policemen.

The U.S. military also announced the death of two of its soldiers last month across the country, bringing the overall death toll for U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq to 4,454 since the breakout of the U.S.-led war on Iraq in 2003, according to media account based on Pentagon figures.

U.S. troops in Iraq had been reduced to below 47, 000 soldiers until the end of April. Washington said that the remaining U.S. troops in Iraq are conducting support and training missions.

U.S. military forces are to pull out completely from Iraq by the end of 2011, according to a security pact signed late in 2008 between Baghdad and Washington.

Violence in the country underscores the challenges that the Iraqi security forces are facing as they struggle to restore stability and normalcy in Iraqi cities about seven months before the departure of all U.S. forces by the end of 2011.

Source: Xinhua

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