'Iraqi govt hiding true casualty figures'

The daily quoted a telegram sent by the head of the UN mission in Iraq, Ashraf Qazi, to headquarters in New York, in which he said: "This development risks damaging the capacity of the UN's Assistance Mission to report the number of civilians killed or injured."

Since July 2005 the UN has used data provided by Baghdad's Forensic Institute and the Iraqi health ministry to form an estimate. The estimate "was certainly imperfect but an indicator nonetheless of the growing number of civilian victims", the telegram said.

The latest report said that 3,590 civilians died a violent death in July and 3,009 in August, figures which it said were "unprecedented".

But the telegram quoted by Le Monde said that on September 21, one day after publication of the report, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki wrote to the health ministry with instructions not to disclose more figures.

In an investigation published in British medical weekly The Lancet earlier this month, US and Iraq specialists estimated that more than 600,000 civilians died a violent death between March 2003 and July 2006.

US President George W. Bush questioned the investigation's findings.

Meanwhile, the US military said on Thursday it was reviewing strategy in Baghdad, where US reinforcements have failed to halt spiralling violence, and expressed grave concern about mounting troop deaths.

The battle for control of Baghdad, which US officials say will decide Iraq's future, and a spate of attacks across Iraq on Thursday that killed at least 38 people piled pressure on President Bush before the November mid-term election.