Dozens of bodies found across Baghdad
Gruesome reprisals appear to intensify after particularly bloody weekend
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Police found at least 65 bodies in Baghdad in the past 24 hours, including 15 men bound and shot in an abandoned minibus, in a gruesome wave of apparent sectarian reprisal attacks, officials said Tuesday.
The timing of the killings appeared related to the car bomb and mortar attacks in the Shiite slum of Sadr City in east Baghdad on Sunday in which 58 people died and more than 200 were wounded.
The sectarian violence marked the second wave of mass killings in Iraq since Feb. 22, when bombers destroyed an important Shiite Muslim shrine in Samarra, north of the capital.
Carnage in Baghdad
The minibus was found on the main road between two mostly Sunni neighborhoods in west Baghdad, not far from where another minibus containing 18 bodies was discovered last week.
Dozens of bodies were found in both Sunni and Shiite areas, many of them among Baghdad’s most dangerous neighborhoods, said Maj. Falah al-Mohammedawi of the Interior Ministry, which oversees police.
A number of them were recovered from Sadr City, where two car bombs and four mortar rounds shattered shops and market stalls at nightfall Sunday, killing at least 58 people and injuring more than 200 as residents shopped for food for their evening meals.
Scorched pavement, destroyed shops and burned out cars awaited Shiite residents emerging from their homes Monday in Sadr City.
The scene, although gruesome, was not what many had feared: That the deadly explosions the previous night would ignite all-out civil war.
Radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr’s refused to be provoked. With thousands of his Mahdi Army militiamen ready to fight, the anti-American leader called for calm and national unity.
Troop cuts for Britain
Britain, the United States’ largest military partner in Iraq, showed its confidence in an Iraqi peace Monday by announcing a 10 percent — about 800-troop — reduction by May.
“This is a significant reduction which is based largely on the ability of the Iraqis themselves to participate and defend themselves against terrorism, but there is a long, long way to go,” British Defense Secretary John Reid said in London.
The United States hopes to begin withdrawing some of its troops by this summer if a new Iraqi government is in place and judged sufficiently in control. But sectarian violence and political bickering has stalled the process.
Bush launches PR offensive
In Washington, President Bush said insurgents were trying to ignite a civil war by escalating violence.
“I wish I could tell you that the violence is waning and that the road ahead will be smooth,” Bush said in a speech at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies at George Washington University. “It will not. There will be more tough fighting and more days of struggle, and we will see more images of chaos and carnage in the days and months to come.”
Bomb blasts and shootings in Baghdad and north of the capital, many of them targeting Iraqi police patrols, killed at least 15 people Monday and wounded more than 40. They included a U.S. soldier who died in a roadside bombing, the military said. A U.S. Marine was reported killed Sunday in insurgent-plagued Anbar province.
The American deaths brought the number of U.S. military members killed to at least 2,308 since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
Iraqi police manned checkpoints Monday at main entrances to Sadr City, and armed militiamen fanned out inside the neighborhood. Many people ventured out only to buy food.
Under the watchful eye of armed militiamen, market vendors picked through the charred, twisted remains of their stalls to salvage what they could.
'We will not be silent any more'
Abdel Karim al-Bahadli, 42, wept when he saw the devastation at the market close to his home. He blamed the extremist Sunni Takfiri sect of terrorist boss Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, leader of al-Qaida in Iraq.
“This is not resistance because there were no U.S. troops in the markets yesterday,” he said. “The Takfiris are only after Shiites. We will not be silent any more.”
Sadr City residents had feared an attack like this one after al-Sadr’s fighters stormed out of the slum to take revenge on Sunni Muslims and their mosques after the Feb. 22 bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra.
Politicians scrambled Monday to keep a lid on violence.
President Jalal Talabani said terrorists bent on civil war had taken advantage of a power vacuum caused by the delay in forming the government.
“It is the duty of the political groups to accelerate efforts to form the government, and the armed forces and security bodies should act swiftly to eliminate such crimes,” he said.
Al-Sadr, addressing reporters in the Shiite holy city of Najaf, appeared to absolve the larger Sunni community, saying: “Sunnis and Shiites are not responsible for such acts.” Instead, he blamed al-Qaida in Iraq and U.S. forces.
Sheik Ahmed Abdul Ghafour al-Samaraie, head of the Sunni Endowment, the state agency responsible for Sunni mosques and shrines, called the Sadr City attack “a cowardly and criminal act.”
“There are some hands trying to add fuel to the fire for their own benefit,” he said on television.
Iraq’s new parliament was to convene for the first time Thursday, three months after it was elected, to begin the process of forming the next government. The session will set in motion a 60-day deadline for the legislature to elect a president, approve a prime minister and sign off on his Cabinet.