Iraq: US troops ‘starve Iraqi citizens’

A senior United Nations official has accused US-led coalition troops of depriving Iraqi civilians of food and water in breach of humanitarian law.

Human rights investigator Jean Ziegler said coalition forces were using “starvation of civilians as a method of warfare.”

Mr Ziegler, a Swiss-born sociologist, said such tactics were in breach of international law.

A US military spokesman in Baghdad denied the allegations.

The Geneva Conventions forbid depriving civilians of food and water.