Baghdad - Bomb attacks in Baghdad have hit an all-time
high, the US military said on Wednesday, as one of the capital's frontline
police units was pulled off the streets on suspicion of involvement with
sectarian death squads.
Residents walk away from the scene of a car
bomb attack which targeted the convoy of Iraq's Industry Minister Fawzi
al-Hariri in Baghdad, October 4, 2006.
[Reuters] |
Thousands of police face criminal vetting and lie detectors as part of a
"retraining" process designed to weed out militia killers who have used the
cover of their uniforms to kidnap, torture and commit mass murder, US officials
have said.
The overnight orders to move the 8th National Police Brigade into barracks
and arrest one of its commanders came a day after Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki
unveiled a sketchy deal with Sunni leaders and fellow Shi'ites to try to stem
violence. But there was still no sign of further talks to provide substance.
US military spokesman Major General William Caldwell said the number of car
bombs in Baghdad, both detonated and defused, hit their highest level of the
year last week and that bombs reported in general were "also at an all-time
high."
US and Iraqi forces have mounted a major military operation in the past two
months against militants in Baghdad.
For the second time in two days, four US soldiers were killed in a single
incident around Baghdad, this time in what appears to have been a substantial
skirmish involving mortars or rockets and gunfire to the northwest. It took the
death toll in four days of the month to 15 around Baghdad and 22 in total.
Caldwell described it as a "hard week" for US forces, who typically suffer
two to three deaths a day on average in Iraq.
Fourteen people were killed and 75 wounded when a car bomb struck a
government motorcade in Baghdad. Police said the industry minister, a Kurd, was
in the motorcade but aides said no senior officials were in the convoy.
The blast in the Christian Karrada commercial area damaged buildings and left
blood and mangled cars in the street.
Death Squads
Under pressure before congressional elections next month from voters keen for
an exit strategy from Iraq, US President Bush has made the training of
Iraqi security forces the focus of hopes to start withdrawing 140,000 US troops.
The same sectarian divisions driving hundreds of killings a week in the
capital are also present among the 300,000 Iraqi soldiers and especially the
police, US officials say.
"There is clear evidence that there was some complicity in allowing death
squad elements to move freely," Caldwell said of the decision to stand down the
8th Brigade, some 700 to 800 men, after US officers reviewed all 27 brigades
last month.
"The determination was made that removing them from Baghdad will be in fact
enhancing the overall security," he said.
Leaders of the once dominant Sunni Arab minority view parts of the largely
Shi'ite national police force, built up last year to help fight Sunni
insurgents, as fronts for Shi'ite militias.
"The individuals ... had not in fact put their full allegiance and commitment
behind the government in Iraq and instead had maintained it to some other
elements outside of the national police," Caldwell said.
All police brigades will be retrained over the coming year.
One US military official described some national police last week as
"absolute ... remnants of humanity" while another, conceding the US role in
recruiting them, said he found it "frightening" meeting some of the men drafted
in from mainly Shi'ite communities to help protect January 2005 elections.
At that time, the main threat was seen as coming from Sunnis loyal to al
Qaeda and Saddam Hussein. Now killing by all factions pressing their own
interests is tearing Iraq apart.
An Interior Ministry spokesman said the 8th Brigade commander arrested on
Tuesday was accused of negligence and failing to report the kidnap of 26 meat
factory workers in southern Baghdad on Sunday. At least 10 have been found dead.
North of Baghdad, in violent Diyala province, an Iraqi army colonel said US
troops arrested 10 Iraqi soldiers suspected of sectarian killings. There was no
immediate US comment.
US and Iraqi officials admit privately to doubts about the sectarian and
ethnic cohesion of the Iraqi security forces if conflict slides toward all-out
civil war for oil and territory.