[Al Arabiya Latest] Iraqi militias are conducting a campaign of torture and murder against men suspected of homosexual activity, a leading rights group said on Monday, adding that government security forces may be involved.New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) said the killings began earlier this year in the poor Sadr City district of Baghdad, once ruled by Shiite Muslim militias, and had since spread to many cities across Iraq.
"'They want us exterminated': Murder, Torture, Sexual Orientation and Gender in Iraq'," said it is almost impossible to calculate how many men were killed, but estimated the figure in the hundreds.
"This report... documents a campaign of violence against men in Iraq who are suspected of being gay or who simply don't act masculine enough in the eyes of their killers," said Scott Long, director of HRW's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Rights Program.