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| Iraq |
| Explosions kill 65 in Iraq |
| 2005-09-30 |
| Just before sunset, the first blast ripped through an open-air market crowded with Iraqis buying vegetables for dinner. The next bomb exploded moments later at a bank just yards away, followed swiftly by a third on a nearby street of clothing shops. Thursday's co-ordinated string of suicide car bombings killed at least 65 people and wounded at least 80 in Balad, an overwhelmingly Shiite town in the largely Sunni region north of Baghdad. The attacks targeting Shiite civilians added to a new surge of violence ahead of an Oct. 15 referendum on Iraq's constitution, whose passage is crucial to prospects for starting a withdrawal of American troops. Sunni insurgents have vowed to wreck the vote, with al-Qaeda in Iraq declaring âall-out warâ on the Shiite majority that dominates Iraq's government. Moderate Sunni Arab leaders called on their community to reject the charter, saying it will fragment Iraq and leave them weak compared to Shiites and Kurds. The U.S. ambassador was struggling to negotiate changes to the charter in hopes of winning Sunni support. Also Thursday, the U.S. military announced the deaths of five U.S. soldiers Wednesday in a roadside bombing during combat in Ramadi, west of Baghdad, a hotbed of Iraq's insurgency. Until Thursday, however, Balad â north of Baghdad and the site of a major U.S. military air base â had seen few major attacks. The blasts left downtown streets strewn with body parts and wounded as emergency vehicles rushed in. The attackers detonated their explosives-packed cars within minutes of each other, starting at 6:45 p.m. local time at the Masraf Street market, then at nearby Bint al-Hassan Street, a major commercial avenue, said Police Lt. Ghafil Hassan. Most of the 65 fatalities were civilians, though among the 80 wounded were the police chief and four officers, said Dr. Bassim al-Baldawi of Balad Hospital. Another doctor there, Khaled al-Azawi, said the toll could reach 75 dead and 100 wounded. In Washington, the top American commander in Iraq said Thursday that the process of withdrawing U.S. troops depends greatly on the results of the referendum and elections set to take place if the constitution passes. âThe next 75 days are going to be critical,â Gen. George Casey told the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee. Sunni Arab success in rejecting the draft constitution would set back the political process for months, prolonging Iraq's political instability. Sunnis make up only 20 per cent of the population, but they could defeat the constitution because of a loophole in voting rules: If two-thirds of voters in any three of Iraq's 18 provinces vote âno,â the referendum fails â even if an overall majority approves. There are four provinces where Sunni Arabs could potentially cross that margin. U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad has been shuttling between all sides, trying to secure last-minute changes to the draft, which parliament approved Sept. 18 after tough negotiations. He has met rejections from Shiites and Kurds on some proposed changes, and some Sunni officials said the proposals were still not enough. Further straining the process, Sunni officials said U.S. forces raided the Baghdad homes of Adnan al-Dulaimi and Harith al-Obeidi, senior officials in the Conference for Iraq's People, a prominent Sunni political group. Mr. al-Dulaimi, 73, said soldiers in tanks and Humvees broke into his home at 2:30 a.m. local time, put him and his family in a guest room and searched the house, arresting four of his bodyguards and confiscating weapons he said were licensed. âIt was if they were attacking a castle, not the home of a normal person who advises Iraq's interim government and has called for reconciliation and renounced sectarianism,â said Mr. al-Dulaimi, his group's secretary-general and an adviser to the Iraqi president on religious affairs. Mr. al-Dulaimi said the Americans were acting on a false tip that his bodyguards had links to insurgents. The U.S. military said it conducted several raids Thursday in the areas of Baghdad where the leaders live but could not identify the homes involved. Sunni leaders complain the constitution does not emphasize Iraq's unity and Arab character. They say its federal system â which would allow Shiites in the south and Kurds in the north to form mini-states â will isolate Sunnis in a weak middle region, cheated of oil resources. Mr. Khalilzad met with the top Kurdish leaders, Iraqi President Jalal Talabani and Massoud Barzani, on Wednesday and conveyed three changes sought by Sunnis, said Fuad Massoum, a Kurdish member of the constitutional commission. Mr. Massoum said the changes concern: confirming the use of Arabic along with Kurdish in the northern Kurdistan region; adding a clause stating that âIraq is a single nation, and the constitution guarantees its unityâ; and allowing parliament to alter the constitution by a two-thirds vote rather than requiring a referendum. Mr. Khalilzad earlier presented the same proposals to Shiite leaders, said Humam Hamoudi, the Shiite head of the constitutional committee. Both Kurds and Shiites rejected the third proposal, Mr. Massoum and Mr. Hamoudi said. The Kurds want the second proposal rephrased to âfederal nationâ instead of âsingle nation,â though they accept the first provision, Mr. Massoum said. Even so, one of the main Sunni Arab parties, the Iraqi Islamic Party, said that acceptance of all three changes would not be enough for some Sunni leaders. Party official Nasser al-Ani said his side had put forward 12 proposals, including changes in the federal system that Shiites and Kurds have insisted cannot be altered. âIf the American ambassador revealed only three of our 12 demands, this would not be satisfactory,â he said. A U.S. official confirmed that Mr. Khalilzad was seeking âtweaksâ in about a half-dozen points in the draft âto maximize the public support.â He said agreement was closest on the use of Arabic in Kurdistan and on âIraq's identity as a nation stateâ but would not discuss the other points. The changes âwill absolutely help, because the Sunni Arabs' main concerns have been the unity of Iraq,â he said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the discussion. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |
| #4 Vive la Resistance |
| Posted by: Janice 2005-09-30 03:50 |
| #3 The attacks targeting Shiite civilians added to a new surge of violence ahead of an Oct. 15 referendum on Iraq's constitution, whose passage is crucial to prospects for starting a withdrawal of American troops. Could someone please give me a link to the actual referendum on October 15th? I haven't been able to find it to know what they are actually voting on. |
| Posted by: Jan 2005-09-30 10:45 |
| #2 ghoul |
| Posted by: raptor 2005-09-30 08:09 |
| #1 thank you Janice Your celebration of the cold blooded murder of civilians speaks volumes. |
| Posted by: mhw 2005-09-30 06:54 |