British government "lost track" of dead soldiers

By GottaLaff

I'm at a loss for expletives. This rivals even BushCo's insensitivity and incompetence:

Ministers were last night accused of 'incompetence and insensitivity' after it was revealed that a list of war dead compiled for MPs and Her Majesty's coroner had missed out dozens of dead British soldiers.

Professor Sheila Bird, who discovered the 'forgotten soldiers' during a detailed study of the military inquest system for the Medical Research Council, said the government appeared to have lost track of the actual date of death of the fatally injured soldiers.

Families of troops killed in Afghanistan and Iraq last night reacted with outrage amid calls for an inquiry into the 'disappeared' dead soldiers.

You lose your keys. You lose your sunglasses. You even lose your mind. But you do not lose track of the deaths of soldiers who gave their lives for your country, and whose families are devastated twice over now, as a result.

Corroborative analysis by Tory MP Patrick Mercer of ministerial statements concerning the death toll suggest that as many as 33 dead British soldiers literally vanished from the list of fatalities awaiting inquests given to parliament by defence and justice ministers.

Maureen Shearer, who waited more than 550 days for an inquest verdict into her son Richard's death in Iraq from a roadside bomb:

"...It's bad enough to feel that your son died for no good reason, but to feel they were not even cared about to the extent they disappeared is dreadful. I cannot imagine how it must be for parents whose sons literally disappeared in every sense."