Militias intensify rein of terror in Baghdad

 

By Salah Salman

 

Azzaman, November 11, 2006

 

Heavily armed militias riding in cars with Interior Ministry marks have intensified their attacks on residential areas.

 

It is now extremely difficult in Baghdad to distinguish between vehicles government forces use and those the city’s murderous militias deploy.

 

Residents say the line separating marauding militias from government police and military forces is so blurred. Many now say the militias’ brutal activities are being carried out in cahoots with government forces.

 

Last week gangs of factional militias belonging to groups which are part of the current coalition government attacked two Sunni mosques in Baghdad, killing four and injuring 18.

 

Eyewitnesses said the gangs, wearing government army uniforms were openly assisted by Interior Ministry commandos in their attacks.

 

As sectarian violence continues, there are reports of a surge in crime and attacks by different groups across the country.

 

A suicide bomber attacked a military checkpoint in the northern city of Tal Affar, killing Lt. Colonel Kareem Jassem and five of his bodyguards.

 

Bodies of men and women, some of them mutilated, are not only surfacing in Baghdad. Police reports speak of scores of corpses dumped in open spaces and ranches in various villages and towns.

 

A police colonel was kidnapped in Baghdad on Friday and the identity of the abductors is not known. Kidnapping of army and police officers has increased but the ministries of interior and defense now see abductions of even senior officers as something normal amid the spiraling violence.

 

In Diwaynia, a police report said a former member of the Baath party was killed. Thousands of Baath party members have been assassinated since U.S. troops invaded the country.

 

In Mosul, fishermen spotted the corpse of woman floating on the River Tigris. The bullet-riddled body brought to the shore had traces of torture, the police said.

 

Armed men, in police garb, kidnapped the head of the Iraqi Red Crescent in Baghdad, Dr. Ans al-Azzawi.