Sectarian Violence Kills 111 in Iraq
By ALEXANDRA ZAVIS, Associated Press Writer
Thu Feb 23, 12:14 PM ET
http://news.yahoo.com
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Gunmen shot dead 47 civilians and left their bodies in
a ditch near Baghdad Thursday as militia battles and sectarian
reprisals followed the bombing of a sacred Shiite shrine. Sunni Arabs
suspended their participation in talks on a new government.
At least 111 people were believed killed in two days of rage unleashed
by Wednesday's attack on the Askariya shrine in Samarra, a mostly Sunni
Arab city 60 miles north of Baghdad.
The hardline Sunni Clerical Association of Muslim Scholars said 168
Sunni mosques had been attacked around the country, 10 imams killed and
15 abducted since the shrine attack. The Interior Ministry said it
could only confirm figures for Baghdad, where it had reports of 19
mosques attacked, one cleric killed and one abducted.
The bullet-ridden bodies of a prominent female correspondent and two
other journalists who had been covering Wednesday's explosion in
Samarra were found on the outskirts of the city.
The sectarian violence threatened to derail U.S. plans to form a new
national unity government representing all factions, including Sunni
Arabs, who form the backbone of the insurgency.
President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, summoned political leaders to a
meeting Thursday. But the biggest Sunni faction in the new parliament,
the Iraqi Accordance Front, refused to attend, citing the attacks on
Sunni mosques.
"It is illogical to negotiate with parties that are trying to damage
the political process," said Tariq al-Hashimi, a leader of the
Accordance Front.
President Bush said the bombing was intended to divide the Iraqi
people.
"The act was an evil act," Bush said. "The destruction of a holy site
is a political act intending to create strife. So I am pleased with the
voices of reason that have spoken out."
Bush said the U.S. was committed to helping rebuild the mosque.
As the country veered toward sectarian war, the government extended a
curfew in Baghdad and Salaheddin province for two days. All leaves for
Iraqi soldiers and police were canceled and personnel ordered to report
to their units.
The U.S. military said four soldiers from the 1st Brigade Combat Team,
101st Airborne Division, were killed Wednesday when their vehicle hit a
roadside bomb near Hawijah.
Three others from the 3rd Heavy Brigade Combat Team of the 4th Infantry
Division died when their vehicle struck a roadside bomb Wednesday near
Balad, 50 miles north of Baghdad.
Radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr accused the Iraqi government and
U.S. forces of failing to protect the Samarra shrine, also known as the
Golden Mosque, and ordered his militia to defend Shiite holy sites
across Iraq.
"If the government had real sovereignty, then nothing like this would
have happened," al-Sadr said in a statement. "Brothers in the Mahdi
Army must protect all Shiite shrines and mosques, especially in
Samarra."
The destruction of the gleaming dome of the 1,200-year-old Askariya
shrine sent crowds of angry Shiites into the streets across Iraq. The
crowds included members of al-Sadr's Mahdi Army and other Shiite
militias that the United States wants abolished.
A spokesman for the Sunni Association of Muslim Scholars blamed the
violence on the country's top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali
al-Sistani, and other Shiite religious leaders who called for
demonstrations against the shrine attack.
Abdul-Salam Al-Kubaisi also said U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad may
also have enflamed the situation when he warned Monday that the United
States would not continue to support institutions run by sectarian
groups with links to armed militias. Sunnis accuse Shiite militiamen
operating in the ranks of the Interior Ministry, which controls the
police, of widespread abuses.
"Without doubt, these statements mobilized all the Shiites," al-Kubaisi
said. "It made them ready to go down to the street at any moment."
British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said Thursday that he suspects
Al-Qaida in Iraq, led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, was responsible for the
mosque attack.
"It has the hallmarks of their nihilism," Straw told a news conference
in London. He called on leaders of Iraq's religious communities to
defuse tensions caused by the attack.
Prime Minister Tony Blair said the attack was "an act of
desperation as well as desecration."
In Diyala, a religiously mixed province northeast of Baghdad, 47 bodies
were found in a ditch. Officials said the victims appeared to have been
stopped by gunmen, forced out of their cars and shot in an industrial
area near Baqouba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad. Most were aged
between 20 and 50 and appeared to include both Sunnis and Shiites,
police said.
Dozens more bodies were found dumped at sites in Baghdad and the Shiite
heartland in southern Iraq, many of them with their hands bound and
shot execution-style.
Fighting broke out Thursday afternoon in Mahmoudiya, south of Baghdad,
between al-Sadr's Mahdi Army militia and Sunni militiamen. Two
civilians were killed and five militiamen were injured, police Capt.
Rashid al-Samaraie said.
Gunmen fired automatic weapons and grenades at a Sunni mosque in
Baqouba, killing one mosque employee and injuring two others, police
said. Assailants also set fire to two Sunni mosques in eastern Baghdad,
police said.
Thousands of demonstrators carrying Shiite flags and banners marched
through parts of Baghdad, Karbala, Kut, Tal Afar and the Shiite holy
city of Najaf in protest against the shrine attack.
U.S. military units in the Baghdad area were told Thursday morning to
halt all but essential travel. Commanders feared that convoys might be
caught up in demonstrations or road blocks.
Nineteen people, 11 of them civilians, died in two bombings north of
Baghdad that appeared unrelated to the sectarian fighting.
___
Associated Press writers Charles J. Hanley and Qassim Abdul-Zahra in
Baghdad, Hana al-Daghistani in Baqouba, and Ziad Khalaf in Samarra
contributed to this report.
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