Nearly 1,000 Egypt Workers Died in Iraq, 60% of Them Violently

Nearly 1,000 Egyptian workers died in Iraq during the past nine months, and evidence from those who had autopsies performed showed that 60% of the deaths were caused by bullet wounds and skull fractures, the government said.

Interior Minister Mohammed Abdel-Halim Moussa told the state newspaper Al Ahram that the dead were all men aged 19 to 44. Moussa’s statement is being published today, and an advance copy of the report was obtained by the Associated Press.

Moussa made his statement after submitting a report Monday to President Hosni Mubarak about the marked increase in the number of Egyptians dying in Iraq following Baghdad’s Aug. 2 invasion of Kuwait.

More than 1 million Egyptians--most of them imported workers--were in Iraq when it invaded Kuwait. Egypt has strongly opposed the invasion and has contributed thousands of troops to the multinational force sent to Saudi Arabia to defend against a possible Iraqi attack. There were reports before the invasion that some Iraqi soldiers returning home after the 1988 cease-fire in the Iran-Iraq War attacked Egyptian workers in the belief that the Egyptians had taken their jobs.