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| Iraq-Jordan |
| Iraqi troops rescue Shiite hostages in besieged town |
| 2005-04-17 |
| Update on the situation with some interesting background. BAGHDAD : Iraqi troops rescued several Shiite hostages after they battled their way into a town where Sunni extremists abducted dozens of people and threatened to kill the town's Shiite residents. The hostage-taking in Al-Madain south of Baghdad has sparked fears of wider sectarian strife between Iraq's Shiite majority and the Sunnis at a time when leaders from both communities seek agreement on the make-up of a government. Parliament was meeting Sunday, but a new government was not expected to be announced before the end of the week. "Police forces, backed by coalition forces, entered the town at 9:00 am (05H00 GMT) and encountered severe resistance from the terrorists", a defence ministry official told AFP. Government forces have recaptured half of the town and freed 10 to 15 families held hostage by the gunmen, he said, adding that the clashes were continuing. Officials have suggested the number of Shiite hostages in town could be as high as 80. National Security Advisor Qassem Daoud told the Al-Arabiya satellite news channel: "Iraqi security forces have the situation under control and are dealing with the hostage takers in a serious manner." Iraqi army special forces on Saturday surrounded the town, home to Shiites and Sunnis, in hopes of averting a sectarian bloodbath that could badly damage Iraq's ethnic and religious ties. On Saturday afternoon, gunmen blew up the building housing the Husseiniyat al-Rasul al-Adham mosque in Madain, a town 30 kilometres (18 miles) south of Baghdad built on the ruins of the ancient city of Ctesiphon, said a source at the interior ministry, adding that it was empty at the time. The same source said events in Madain may be a tit-for-tat kidnapping of Shiites after the abduction of Sunnis from the powerful Dulaimi tribe, who have a presence in the area. A spokesman for radical Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr, Abdul Hadi al-Darraji also suggested the incident may be part of a settling of scores among some families in the community. "They have detained more than 80 people, including women and children, and they are threatening to kill them unless Shiites leave", one of the refugees, Captain Haitham Mohammed of the Iraqi army, told AFP on Friday. The road linking Baghdad with Kut, 200 kilometres (120 miles) to the south, is among the most dangerous in the country where several beheaded bodies have surfaced in recent months. The area around Madain and neighbouring Salman Pak is home to several Sunni Arab tribes who follow the radical Wahabi brand of Islam that dominates Saudi Arabia and recent reports suggested that Shiites have set up vigilante groups for protection. Daoud's fellow National Security Advisor Muwaffaq al-Rubaie blamed the rising wave of Islamic extremism around Madain on Saddam's policy of settling Sunni extremists in the stretch of towns just south of Baghdad after the 1991 Shiite uprising against the old regime. "Saddam started a policy of 'colonies' whereby he allowed and encouraged some of the Sunni extremists to live at the southern Baghdad borders ... basically to put a human barrier between Baghdad and the (Shiite) south and stop any future uprising in the south from reaching Baghdad." Rubaie urged Iraq's 15-million-strong Shiite majority not to carry out reprisals against the country's Sunnis, dominant under Saddam Hussein and believed to form the backbone of the current insurgency. "We have called for people not to take the law into their own hands," Rubaie said. "In killing innocent Sunnis, this is what the extremist Salafists want. They want to draw the Shiites into a sectarian conflict. This is a fatal mistake." The latest incident in Madain came as the Shiites have been trying to woo the Sunnis, who largely boycotted the January 30 elections, to join the political process. "The more this process drags on, the more terrorist attacks and instability we'll see," said outgoing Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari told AFP. In the latest insurgency attack, an Iraqi officer of the Wolf Brigade, who have taken a leading role in the fight against militants, was gunned down in Baghdad's al-Iskan neighbourhood on Saturday evening, an interior ministry official said. Two senior Iraqi police officers were also shot dead by insurgents Sunday morning and Saturday evening in the northern town of Mosul and in the capital, Baghdad, police and hospital sources said. |
| Posted by:phil_b |
| #1 This is really good news. |
| Posted by: anymouse 2005-04-17 2:49:52 PM |