Open acts of defiance by opponents of Saddam Hussain's regime have intensified in the past week, with saboteurs carrying out attacks against Iraq's railway system and protesters openly calling for the overthrow of the Iraqi dictator. The most blatant act of sabotage took place 20 miles south of the north Iraqi city of Mosul when members of the Iraqi opposition blew up a stretch of track on the Mosul-Baghdad railway, causing the derailment of a train. Before fleeing back to their base in Kurdistan, they left piles of leaflets by the side of the track urging the Iraqi soldiers who were sent to investigate the explosion to join the "international alliance to liberate Iraq" from "Saddam the criminal". In a separate incident, a rocket-propelled grenade was fired at a train illegally transporting fuel from Baghdad to Syria.
The resistance preparing for "D-day".
Demonstrations were also reported to have taken place in Kirkuk, where an estimated crowd of 20,000 marched on the Baath party's main administrative headquarters demanding Saddam's overthrow. Three posters of the Iraqi leader were torn down and a grenade was thrown at the government building. One senior Baath official was reported killed in the attack. There were also unconfirmed reports that another demonstration in the holy city of Kerbala last weekend was violently suppressed after the intervention of militiamen loyal to Saddam. The escalation in attacks by Iraqi opposition groups has also been accompanied by widespread acts of anti-Saddam vandalism. Posters of the Iraqi president, which adorn every public building, are being openly defaced and vandalised throughout the country.
Sounds promising.
Until recently anyone caught carrying out such acts would have received the death sentence. But the mounting acts of open defiance against Saddam's regime is indicative of the growing confidence being displayed by the main Iraqi opposition groups.
"Until recently such acts of open defiance were very rare, and were dealt with harshly," a British Foreign Office official commented. "But as Saddam concentrates his energies on trying to protect his regime from attack, Iraqi opposition groups are becoming more audacious in their attacks." The only area where Saddam can rely with confidence on the loyalty of his security forces is in the Baath party's heartland around Baghdad. In an attempt to reassert his authority Saddam last week issued a directive ordering Iraqi officials not to give up their positions and flee the country. To set an example, members of Saddam's security forces arrested a civil servant in the Al Hurriyya suburb of Baghdad on suspicion of preparing to leave the country. The unfortunate official was then tied to a pole in the street and passers-by were ordered to watch as his tongue was cut out and he was left to bleed to death.
This will just teach them to be more careful. |