Free the Captives: Witness Against Illegal Detention and Torture

Aljazeera:

Three years after the invasion of Iraq, US leaders have rejected claims that the country is sliding into civil war and said they remain optimistic that a stable democratic society can emerge.

The remarks followed widely publicised comments on Sunday by former Iraqi premier Iyad Allawi that the country had already plunged into civil war.

General George Casey, commander of US military forces in Iraq, argued on Sunday that an Iraq civil war was neither "imminent" nor "inevitable".

"I personally don't believe ... that we're there now," he said, referring to civil war.

Reuters: Leaving Iraq now would be the same as "handing postwar Germany back to the Nazis," U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said in a column published on Sunday, as retired U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton called Rumsfeld incompetent and urged him to resign.

"The terrorists seem to recognize that they are losing in Iraq. I believe that history will show that to be the case," Rumsfeld said. [...]

But in an opinion piece published on Sunday in the New York Times, Eaton said Rumsfeld had proven himself "not competent to lead our armed forces" and therefore "must step down."

The Associated Press:

President Bush marked the anniversary of the Iraq war Sunday by touting the efforts to build democracy there and avoiding any mention of the daily violence that rages three years after he ordered an invasion.

The president didn't utter the word "war."

Meanwhile in Iraq,

As the Iraq war entered its fourth year, nearly 1,500 U.S. and Iraqi soldiers on Sunday sought to root out insurgents from farming villages an hour's drive north of the capital, and at least 35 people died in insurgent and sectarian violence nationwide.

And there was no news on Sunday March 19 of the three CPT peaceworkers still held captive in Iraq. We repeat our call to their captors – let them go, safely and immediately!