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16 October 2006

Iraq reconciliation conference on hold as 83 die in weekend of violence

IRAQ’S government has indefinitely postponed a much-anticipated national reconciliation conference yesterday as at least 83 people were reported dead in two days of sectarian revenge killings and insurgent bombings.

Meanwhile, the US military reported the deaths of a marine and four soldiers.

A brief statement from the Ministry of State for National Dialogue said the Iraqi political powers conference planned for Saturday had been put off because of “emergency reasons out of the control of the ministry”.

The failure to bring Iraq’s deeply divided politicians together appeared likely to exacerbate Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s attempts to strengthen political consensus, underscoring the effect worsening violence is having on efforts to stabilise the US-backed government and curb the bloodshed.

Weekend revenge killings among Shi’ites and Sunnis left at least 63 people dead in a city north of Baghdad, while 11 people died in a series of apparently co-ordinated bombings on the Kurdish al-Mallimin girls high school and other targets in the northern city of Kirkuk, where Kurds and Arabs are in a tense struggle for control of the oil-rich city.

Even by Iraq’s bleak standards, October has been an especially bloody month.

Hundreds of Iraqis have died in attacks and 54 US military personnel have been killed in the first two weeks alone.

US commanders say that based on the record of past years, they expect a further rise in bloodshed throughout the Islamic holy month of Ramadan.

Some Islamic militants believe that their dying in combat during Ramadan brings extra blessings in paradise.

The tit-for-tat sectarian killings began late on Friday with the discovery of the decapitated bodies of 17 Shi’ites who had been kidnapped earlier in the day near Balad, a predominantly Sunni region north-west of Baghdad and a hotbed of the insurgency battling US and Iraqi forces.

Suspected Shi’ite militiamen then began targeting Sunnis in Balad and surrounding towns, killing at least 46 overnight, according to police and hospital officials.

Extra police flooded into the area, 50 miles north of Baghdad, to enforce a curfew and additional security measures were taken in other villages in the area, according to Interior Ministry spokesman Brigadier Abdul-Karim Khalaf.

Despite that, bullet-ridden bodies continued to be delivered to the Balad’s main hospital well into the morning, according to a hospital director yesterday.

An army officer in the nearby city of Tikrit confirmed the death toll and said 63 suspects — both Sunnis and Shi’ites — were arrested.

The Iraqi Islamic Party, the country’s largest Sunni political group, said that 30 Sunnis had been killed and accused the Shi’ite-dominated police force of co-operating with the militias in snatching 70 people from Balad hospital and other locations.

“The Iraqi Islamic party condemns the violence in Balad for which we hold the occupation forces and government fully responsible,” the party said in a statement.


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